


Inclusions

by electricalgwen



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Genetic Engineering, M/M, Science Fiction, Space Opera, Supernatural and J2 Big Bang Challenge 2012, neuroscience
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-26
Updated: 2012-07-26
Packaged: 2017-11-10 21:16:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 29,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/470778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricalgwen/pseuds/electricalgwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Earth is sending out her first planetary colonization mission, and only mods need apply. </p>
<p>Mods (legally known as Genetically Modified Persons) underwent a controversial prenatal procedure: injection of a patented DNA modification protocol that rewrote their own genome, streamlining it, removing both major genetic defects and minor imperfections. They’re optimized physically, mentally, immunologically, psychologically, every way imaginable. They are the best of humanity, and the obvious choice to brave the challenges of a new world.</p>
<p>Jared has a pretty decent genome, and an occupation that the colony needs, but he isn’t a mod. He’s desperate to go into space, so he hatches a plan that involves stealing his co-worker (and crush) Jensen’s DNA. He manages to beat the genomic screening tests, and gets accepted as one of the hundred colonists – as does Jensen. During the voyage, he and Jensen hook up, and by the time they land on their new planet, Jared couldn’t be happier. Things quickly start to deteriorate, though, as he discovers Jensen’s seriously prejudiced views against ‘natural’ humans, and as the colonists start being affected by a mysterious and disabling condition – to which Jared appears immune.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for the 2012 round of spn_j2_bigbang. Art by LadyTiferet, who picked me out of an anonymous lineup for the second year in a row and proceeded to capture the vibe of the story perfectly.
> 
> There is a planet called Mirna, but it is not in fact particularly habitable. Probably the best candidate to date for an Earth-like planet is HD85512b, but that rejoices in the name of Rieugnie, which I didn't like, so I picked Mirna randomly out of a list of minor planets.

  


  


_It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change. – Charles Darwin_

_Inclusions (noun): internal characteristics of a diamond; tiny structural imperfections or bits of foreign material trapped in a diamond. Minor inclusions or blemishes are useful, as they provide unique identifying marks and proof of natural origin._

 

 

“The Revolution in Evolution!” announced the cover of TIME.

It was controversial – that was the understatement of the century. But it was always going to be an easy sell to those who could afford it.

“Everyone wants the best for their children,” the compassionate female voice-over says in the ads. The best used to mean private school, violin lessons, braces, trips to Europe, and a big chunk of change in the college fund. Now, the college fund can be spent months before parents even meet their child. University education is ensured by genetic alteration, guaranteeing young Malcolm or Athena a full scholarship to whatever institutions they choose to grace with their presence.

The Prenatal Genetic Modification Protocol – ‘the mod’ – hit the market three decades ago, and it’s still the most contested, debated, legislated, praised and hated medical procedure there is.

It’s for the rich, of course: which has put an interesting kink in the usual arguments about wealth, class, merit, and the deserving poor. The idea of the meritocracy used to level the playing field: the smart poor kid had a chance against the dumb rich kid. Now, if you can afford it, you can _make_ your kid into the most deserving: intelligent, beautiful, athletic.

“These kids will create the future,” Senator Vincent of New York had declared, supporting the first piece of legislation introduced in support of modification. The subsequent announcement that his wife was among the first to undergo the procedure had started a media storm that went on for weeks – until the baby was born and they got a court injunction and reporting ban to protect it. “Modification takes the best of a person and brings it to light. It’s like panning for gold.”

The mod doesn’t alter the basics: hair color, eye color, sex or gender. As far as anyone can tell, it doesn’t alter things like personality type, artistic inclinations or musical ability either. It just… tidies things up. Corrects minor mutations. Optimizes expression of genes for intelligence; suppresses tendencies towards addiction or mental illness; strengthens immunity, cancer resistance, and healing. Vision, hearing, smell – all the senses are flawless.

“Completely Human. Completely Perfect!” said the billboards.

Why would anyone, any parent who could afford it, enter the genetic lottery?

And part of the reason the cost is so astronomical is that it’s heritable. By changing the genetic material of embryos at such an early stage, the mod incorporates itself in the germline, and gets passed on. You’re not just ensuring your child’s future. You’re ensuring the future of generations yet unborn. _Your_ DNA, only with all its nasty little imperfections smoothed away, heading into the future. With healthy skin, bright eyes, symmetrical faces – the mods push all the buttons signaling reproductive fitness. They’ll never lack for willing partners.

It’s an almost irresistible call to the evolutionary instinct for survival and reproduction.

That’s not to say there wasn’t a lot of resistance. Nearly every religious group issued statements against it. Most of the objections were pretty standard: playing God; interfering with nature; devaluing human life.

The fact that the modification procedure required injection into the umbilical cord, with a resultant two percent risk of miscarriage, was also the focus of vigorous pro-life protesting. The billboard ads were constantly spray-painted over with anti-mod rhetoric. Protesters handed out flyers in the streets. Pregnant women who had chosen not to mod (and probably some who had) displayed little pins reading “GMO Free!” or “Contains No GMOs!” Mod company labs and clinics had better security than most government buildings. A lot of work and research funds over the years have gone towards making a version of the mod that would work on adults, adolescents, even children, but so far no luck; it doesn’t take properly. It has to get into stem cells, and the earlier the better. Fetal modification – or _PRENATAL ASSAULT ON THE PERSON!!!_ according to some – is still required.

All these objections were entirely predictable, as they were for test-tube babies, for genetic screening of embryos, for prenatal testing and amniocentesis. Any countries ruled by a theocracy banned the mod outright. Most placed strict laws and controls on it. A few places already known for medical tourism saw it as an excellent opportunity to make money off rich foreigners – results of course not guaranteed, particularly as they often weren’t using the patented version.

In the USA, regulation still happens at state level. People have been expecting a constitutional challenge for years now, but it turns out nobody’s been willing to step up to the plate and become the 21st century’s _Roe vs. Wade._ It would take a lot of guts, and twice as much money, to fund that fight, and the patent holders aren’t really interested. They run their clinics in the states that accept them, and they don’t ask questions of the wealthy people who walk through the doors. Meanwhile, their clients have enough money and influence to avoid any unpleasantness, even if they hail from a state where the mod is still illegal.

The mod protocol’s thirty years old now, and there’s still a lot of anger, fear, prejudice and controversy. More and more mods are being born, but a lot of parents don’t admit to it, and a lot of mods choose not to make themselves known. There’s no way to tell apart from a DNA test, and no legal requirement to identify oneself as a mod, so a lot of them simply don’t.

Jensen, however, has never been one to hide his nature.

 

  


 

Modification was illegal in the state of Texas when he was born. It still is. His mother crossed state lines, went up north when she first found out she was carrying him. She and his father mortgaged their house and cashed in everything they had, in order to inject the fetus now known as Jensen with the experimental primer that rewrote his genome and his future before he ever saw the light of day.

The mod hadn’t been invented when his older brother was born. By the time his sister was conceived, the procedure was known beyond a doubt to be successful and rates had tripled; there was no way his parents could have afforded to modify another child.

He’s pretty sure his mother wouldn’t have done it anyway, though. She isn’t too pleased with the way he’s turned out.

The ironic thing is that it wasn’t the result of the mod. At least not directly. He can’t be sure, of course – the old nature vs. nurture debate – but Jensen thinks the gap between him and his parents grew out of their _perception_ of difference, rather than his inborn emotional ability. They didn’t treat him the same as they treated Jeff. They expected more from him, were more critical, analyzed his every word and action. For a small child, who might be genetically optimized but was still only three and was a human being, not a robot, living in an atmosphere like that led to frustration, resentment, and an emotional distance that never resolved.

Worst of all is, he knows his mother regrets it. She’s never admitted it, but he can tell. He’s the smartest one in the family, after all.

It can’t be helped, though. He’s not the first son to disappoint his parents, simply by being what he is, and he won’t be the last.

 

  


 

There are still rallies and pickets, protesting the abominations masquerading as people: unnatural, man-made things, flying in the face of the Lord.

There’s one going on outside Misha’s lab right now, in fact. He watches it with interest through the security glass in his window.

“Modifying GOD’S WILL!” their leader bellows into a megaphone.

Misha hates it when he ends up siding with the crazies.

There’s a knock at his door. Whoever it is doesn’t wait for a response before pushing it open.

“Why did we invent sex to start with?” he says.

“Uh,” his latest lab tech says, after a short pause.

Misha goes through lab techs at an alarming rate. He’s not sure why. Claire has been here six weeks, which puts her ahead of the mean already, and seems to be thoroughly enjoying her work. She is, however, one of the most accident-prone people he’s ever met.

“What is the advantage to sexual reproduction?”

He spins his chair around to face the door, raising his eyebrows at the sight of Claire, who is spattered in gentian violet. The damage is mostly to her lab coat, but there’s some in her hair, and a spray on her nose as well that resembles freckles. She is of course wearing required safety gear including a set of plexiglass goggles, but for some reason she has a second set perched on her head above the first.

“Exchange of genetic material,” she says. “You wanted to know when the second batch of gels was done.”

“I did,” Misha nods. “Why are you wearing two pairs of safety glasses?”

“I lost my hairband.”

“Inventive use of resources.”

“That’s what they pay me for.”

“No, they pay me,” Misha corrects. “I pay you. Or more accurately, the ALS Foundation pays you.”

That’s why he’s still here. There are some things that should not exist, things that are truly nasty mutations with no redeeming purpose. Those need to be pruned, edited out of the genome, stamped out of existence.

“I guess that’s one of the downsides of sexual reproduction.”

“What is?” Misha blinks; he’d gone off inside his own head and lost track of the conversation.

Claire never seems to mind. Often Misha’s not sure whether she’s entirely in her own head, either. It balances out.

“Persistence of negative recessive alleles,” she says. “With asexual reproduction, any mutation that kills the organism or renders it substantially unfit will die out as soon as it occurs. But with sex, the recessive genes can hide out and get carried down the generations.”

“Yes,” Misha says. “But it’s worth it.”

Claire gives him a flat look. “Of course you think so. You’re a guy.”

“Not the act itself.” Misha considers. “It is, of course, but that’s not what I meant. The benefits of trading genetic information through sex far outweigh the risks. Having genetically identical clones is a poor survival strategy in the long run.”

“It works for dandelions.”

“For now.” Misha points his pen at her. “Because they’re well adapted to the environment in which they live? But what happens if conditions move outside a tolerable range? If every member of a species is identical, then they are all equally susceptible to changes in the environment. Radiation. Or a new disease could wipe them out. Mixing and matching means you generate a whole lot of phenotypes. Some are better than others – but a plant that’s considered inferior under our current conditions might be the only one genetically qualified to survive a ten-degree rise in average temperature, or a new insect predator.”

“I guess that’s important for plants,” Claire says. “Animal populations, even. But I’m not sure it’s meaningful when you look at human beings. That’s what’s different about humans. We can react with our brains, not just our biology.”

“Our brains _are_ biology.”

“Okay, yeah, but I don’t mean… I mean, we can react intelligently to threats or changes in the environment. Think up solutions. It’s not a matter of being the right color or, or, um, having fur to withstand a colder temperature. We change our environment to suit us. It’s what humans do.”

“And that’s worked out so well.”

“Well, maybe it’ll work out better with more mods in charge?” Claire spreads her hands. “We’re selecting for intelligence, right? The mods are designed to be the best of the human race, and the human race is pretty damn smart and adaptable.”

“Hubris.” Misha shakes his head. “There are always side effects. They may be subtle, but there will be an effect. Did you see Rasmussen’s paper last month? There’s concern that while mods skew to the upper end of traditional IQ testing, emotional intelligence is being lowered or lost.”

Claire’s forehead wrinkles. “I haven’t read that one yet.”

“It’s worth a look, although he’s wrong about the reasons.”

“Wrong how?”

“He thinks it’s purely a genome-based consequence: that the mod is editing out genes that are important in a multifactorial model of empathy. He hasn’t accounted for the non-biological impact of the mod.”

“Didn’t you just say our brains are our biology?”

“Touché,” Misha acknowledges. “I suppose I mean the indirect impact. All the literature on the importance of early childhood attachment on brain development, or the effects of stress on levels of gene expression? We know that biology can be affected and altered by environment ⎯ by both physical and emotional environments.”

He taps his fingers on his desk. “Modified babies have been growing up in an environment of high expectations from their parents. And from general society, they get fear, taunts and threats. Resentment. It’s no surprise they might not score well on a number of the EQ measures.”

“Huh.” Claire thinks that over. “But… aren’t you saying then that it isn’t the fault of the mod itself? That it’s our reactions to it?”

“I’m saying, we can’t always predict the side effects of what we do.”

“Fair enough,” Claire allows.

“Thousands of years of evolution have produced the current variability of human genomes. They’re messy. There’s junk DNA, there’s redundancies. Alleles we don’t see any point to. But I worry that we’ll lose something without recognizing the value of it. Until it’s gone.”

Claire smiles. “Maybe one day there’ll be an Heirloom Human Society. Like there is for tomatoes.”

“Have you looked at any dating websites lately?” Misha says. “‘Natural’ is one of the basic search criteria.”

Claire scuffs her foot. Misha’s noticed she does this when she’s nervous.

“What?” he says.

She bites her lip. “So… why are you here? Why do you work here, if you feel like that?”

It’s a sensible question. Why _is_ Misha working at a genetics company, doing work that will likely one day be incorporated into the mod, when he feels this way?

He takes his time with his answer. She doesn’t need to know all of it, but he wants her to understand. She’s a good scientist.

“It’s important work,” he says finally. “I think it… it needs someone to question it. It’s my responsibility. I can’t just walk away.”

She nods.

“So, gels,” Misha says. “Thanks. I’ll look at them after the meeting.”

“Meeting?” Claire looks blank.

“ _The_ meeting.” Misha raises an eyebrow. “You know, the big meeting with the boss that I told you about last month? The one about the Mirna project. The one that starts in three minutes?”

“Oh shit, is that today?” Claire looks down at herself in dismay.

Misha waves a hand. “Don’t worry about that.”

“Just let me get a clean lab coat!”

She dashes out, then sticks her head back in. “Do you have… oh god, no, why would you…” She disappears again.

“I do, actually,” Misha calls. “Well, not hair elastics, but there’s a couple of barrettes in the micropipette drawer.”

 

  


 

They’re the last ones to the meeting, but thankfully they do get there on time. Jeff Morgan is a stickler for punctuality.

He runs his company with military precision. It’s one of the things that enabled M-Gen to survive the start-up struggle and emerge as one of the main commercially successful genetics companies, as well as one of the major labs supporting research on new modification parameters. It’s also one of the reasons he’s in charge of the Mirna project.

On the surface, it’s a bizarre arrangement, having Earth’s first attempt at a planetary colonization mission run by a private genetics company. However, with all the infighting, split votes, and reluctance to spend money on perceived ‘elite’ causes that the US government had suffered from over the past couple of decades, it didn’t look like anything official was going to get off the ground (literally) any time soon. Other countries talked big, but the global recession had hit them hard too, and there was a general reluctance to pursue an expensive and dangerous venture before fixing conditions at home.

But Jeff Morgan wasn’t going to let his lifetime pass without realizing his dream – some might say obsession – of humans in space. He’d read a lot of science fiction as a kid, and had the knack of recognizing when science fiction was about to become science fact: another quality that contributed to his success.

Six years ago, a research lab at MIT had published an abstract demonstrating the achievement of faster-than-light travel through poly-space dimensional cohesion. News outlets covered the story with either breathless gushing about sci-fi futures, or deep skepticism and flashbacks to the cold fusion debacle. Physicists around the world began working to duplicate or disprove the findings, or re-evaluating theories as to the nature of the universe in light of the new research.

Jeff got on a plane the same day, showed up in their lab, and talked at them about practical applications until they agreed to build him a prototype ship just to make him shut up. (The unprecedentedly large amount of funding he provided didn’t hurt, either. When Jeff went after something, he went full out.)

With that commitment in hand, he’d lobbied the government endlessly, talking about the benefits of exploration, resource development, survivalist principles. They were mildly impressed by his passion, but it was his offer to put up a substantial amount of money, throw the resources of his company behind the project, _and_ provide the ship that eventually got their attention.

They agreed to go ahead with a colonization project. They contracted Jeff’s ship and, after some delicate negotiations with NASA and the military, they eventually agreed to put Jeff himself in charge of organizing things – with lots of advice from government scientists, of course. A cynic would say it’s the ideal set-up for them: if it succeeds, they bask in the glory; if it fails, it’s not the government taking the hit.

Jeff didn’t win all the arguments, though.

At heart, it’s still a government project, and they get to dictate certain rules and regulations. NASA, the Surgeon General, and the MIT space physiology lab have been unanimous on one point. All potential colonists are to be mods.

 _Mods represent the best of humanity,_ they said. They’re optimized for health, strength, and strong immune systems, and have the ability to cope with slightly altered gravity or oxygen. Their psychological resilience is necessary for the challenges of a cramped space voyage and the isolation and stress of a new world. Their high intelligence and problem-solving abilities are mandatory assets for humans facing a task never before undertaken.

It’s kind of hard for Jeff to argue against that, too; after all, he built and owns a company that specializes in genetic modification research and is one of the few licensed treatment facilities in the state. He had no good reason to say no.

Except that it meant he couldn’t go on the ship.

Jeff was a decade too early for the mod; he was born while it was still being developed. It’s no secret that he’d undergo it if he could. A fair bit of M-Gen’s research budget has gone into trying to develop a version that’ll work on adults, but so far that’s been fruitless.

When Jeff found out he wouldn’t be eligible to go himself, he nearly pulled the plug on the project. Misha knows this because Jeff told him that, very late one night, after staggering into the lab in a state of extreme inebriation. He has never shared it with anybody; it’s none of their business. In the light of day, Jeff’s commitment to his belief that humans needed to get out into space outweighed his personal disappointment, and he’s thrown all his energy into making the project succeed.

As a result, he expects nothing less than perfection. Punctuality is only the beginning.

What Misha did not tell Jeff, that night or ever, was that he agrees with him.

Modification is good for an individual – hell, it’s _fantastic_ for individual persons, especially ones whose natural genetic inheritance was not going to be favorable. For a species, though, it might be compared to putting all your eggs in one basket. He thinks it’s a disaster waiting to happen.

He used to voice those opinions, back when he was younger and more naïve. However, while the public might not have embraced the mod wholeheartedly, the medical genetics establishment did. PhD candidates who argued with their supervisor and external thesis examiner over the value of the single biggest development _ever_ in the field were not going to land a post-doctoral fellowship at some Ivy League institution. Or anywhere.

After a few months of near-starvation, and imposing on friends’ couches, he unbent his principles enough to take the ALS Foundation grant. It’s ironic that this has put him working at a mod company, but that’s where the vast majority of genetic work is done these days.

 

  


 

It’s not actually a large meeting. Misha and Claire represent the human genomics division. He recognizes Dr. Peterson, the head of the agricultural biotech division, and Dr. Lehmann, a physician who often consults for the company. There are a couple of people who are clearly government bureaucrats, a man in military uniform, and a woman who’s with NASA according to the logo on her backpack.

Dr. Sam Ferris is there, sprawled on a sofa in the corner. Misha’s not sure why she comes to these meetings. She’s a psychologist or anthropologist, or some kind of not-actually-a-scientist. As Misha understands it, she’s interested in understanding the motivation of people who want to leave their whole world and most of their species behind to build a new world. He’s sure it’s fascinating and all, but why she’s at their planning meeting is beyond him. Claire thinks that Dr. Ferris is sleeping with Jeff. Possibly she’s right; Misha is frequently oblivious to such things. It would explain why Jeff puts up with her.

“Okay,” Jeff says, as the last arrivals take their seats. “The purpose of today’s meeting is to set our specifications for colonists. We’re putting out ads in a couple of weeks, and I expect a lot of applicants. We need to agree on how many we’re accepting.”

He jerks his head at a whiteboard which has various sets of numbers on it. “Obviously, the fewer colonists, the more space we’ve got for gear. Since a small group also makes for a smaller footprint on arrival, we don’t need to send as much prefab housing and stuff. We’d have more room for some of the fancy research equipment you guys want to send,” he glances in Dr. Lehmann’s direction, “plus we could allow for larger back-up reserves. Food, medicine, seeds, whatever.

On the other hand, there’s work that’s got to be done on the other end. Anyone going on this ride has to be willing to cover a number of jobs, including physical labor, but we need to make sure we’ve got all the major skill sets represented, plus some overlap or backup. There’s some basic infrastructure that’s needed no matter how many people we send, and having more hands will make that setup easier and faster.”

He pauses for a gulp of coffee. “I’ve done most of the project planning in terms of jobs and skill sets. Sam,” he glances over at the sofa, where Dr. Ferris appears to have given up on the conversation in favor of having a nap, “is going to give us some guidance as to psychological profiles, in terms of screening the applicants. She’s run some simulations and suggests an initial crew of a hundred and fifty.”

“Far too many,” Misha says at once.

“Huh.” Jeff tilts his head as he turns to stare at Misha. “I expected the objections to come from the engineering guys, not you.”

“Won’t you want as many as you can fit on board?” It’s the NASA woman. “I would think the colony needs to bring as much of the human species’ genetic diversity as possible, to maximize viability.”

“Claire,” Misha says. She blinks in surprise as the room’s attention focuses on her, then takes it away.

“It depends on the type of diversity you’re talking about. They’re all mods, so some of the older models for calculating population viability don’t apply. We’ll balance for ethnicity and heritage, to try and get a broad sample of the non-modified genes, but we don’t have to worry about a lot of the common recessive alleles because they’re fixed by the mod anyway. So we won’t need as many as people used to think.”

She twiddles a stray bit of hair that has escaped Misha’s barrette. “But it’s still important to have a mix, because it’s not just a question of inherited disease or weakness. It’s a matter of whether a single individual is suitably adapted for the environment they’re going to encounter. Even with the explorer probe data, we can’t predict everything the colonists are going to encounter. It may turn out that some are better suited to conditions on the planet than others.”

“I’ll draw up various plans for genetic crosses once we have a final selection of colonists,” Misha says. “The main plan, plus some alternates in case of deaths or inability to reproduce.”

“Actually, that’s a point,” Jeff says, frowning. “Do we need to confirm fertility? Can we do that?”

“No,” says one of the bureaucrats. “That’s too intrusive and personal. You’d never get it past ethics. We already have people complaining about the genetic profiling. They’re arguing that it goes against equal opportunity and the diversity laws.”

“We _are_ bringing diversity.” Jeff thumps his fist on the table. “I’m relying on Dr. Collins to maximize that. Somebody’s always gonna bitch, but this is a question of science and survival. We’ve got to set some quotas, or this isn’t going to work. Take gender balance, as an example. We might say we want the best applicant in each field – medicine, farming, whatever – but we can’t take all men or all women if this colony’s going to become a stable, ongoing population. We’ll have to go with the best people who match up to a fifty-fifty mix.”

Misha shakes his head. “The optimal male to female ratio would actually be about 3 males to every 4 or 5 females.”

Jeff frowns. “How do you get that?”

“Based on relative size.”

“Size?” Jeff snorts. “I know the ship’s got to be efficient, but it’s not that bad. I’ll make sure the guys have enough room.”

“No, no,” Misha says, “it’s a biological indicator. In general, for any given species, the ratio in size between males and females reflects the mating ratio.”

“For mammals, at least,” Claire interjects.

“We are discussing mammals. I thought that was obvious,” Misha says. “The point is, the mating ratio can be inferred. If males are twice the size of females, one male will mate with two females; if they’re the same size, then usually one male will mate with one female.”

“In a given mating period,” Claire interrupts again. Misha sighs.

“With humans, males are – on average – slightly larger than females. This suggests that we are, evolutionarily, optimized for populations with slightly low male-to-female mating ratios.”

“Why?” Dr. Ferris says unexpectedly, opening her eyes. Misha blinks; he hadn’t thought she was paying attention. “I mean, why the size thing?”

“It reflects the number of other males they have to fight for access to females.”

“Ah,” Dr. Ferris says. “And _that’s_ why we’re sending roughly equal numbers.”

Misha tilts his head. “Sorry?”

“We aren’t cavemen, or monkeys,” Dr. Ferris says. “Or pea plants. Optimizing biology is one thing, and I’m sure it’s vitally important, but optimizing social structure is even more important if the group isn’t going to fall apart in the first year.”

“This is already a highly artificial social structure,” Misha says, frowning. “No children, no elders, and probably very few stable pair-bondings.”

“We are likely to have at least a few couples who apply together.” Dr. Ferris sits up. “But you’re right, most will be young and unattached. We need to _allow_ for stable pair-bondings.”

“Not everyone wants stable pair-bondings,” Claire points out.

“Not everyone wants kids, either.” Dr. Ferris sighs. “But we need to allow for the potential. Look, this is my area. I know you lab types think the social sciences are complete hooey, but trust me, there are actual theories and methods involved. I will give you the best model I can for a stable society.”

“I don’t see how pair-bonding fits with genetic diversity.” Misha turns to Jeff. “You told me to work out numbers for genetic stability. Assuming we’re only working with the genetic material of the settlers, that’s going to take at least fifty people, plus you want to allow for a safety margin, in case of accidental loss. That gives an optimal number of sixty colonists, with three-fifths being women. But if you start letting people pair off, we’ll need a whole lot more.”

Dr. Ferris shakes her head. “Not as many as you might think. Simulations based on some real-world examples suggest that it only takes about a hundred and sixty, maybe a couple of hundred tops, to start and sustain a healthy population for over twenty centuries. Without significant inbreeding. And those numbers come from situations _before_ the mod.”

Misha blinks. “Really?”

“Yup.” Dr. Ferris looks smug. “By the time you sort out the number of people you need in various occupations, you’re going to be halfway there anyway.”

“Those can overlap.”

“Only to a certain extent,” Jeff says. “Having one person with multiple occupations doesn’t help if you need two of those occupations in different places at the same time. Some flexibility is good, but there’s still a minimum number of bodies required.”

“And a maximum you can realistically support,” Misha says. “Every extra person on the ship demands a huge input of resources. Her numbers are too high. I can give you a sustainable population with sixty founding members. The logical way to do it is to inform all the colonists of the importance of controlled mating, and plan the children of the next generation so as to optimize crossovers. I don’t see the problem with this.”

“That’s because it requires an understanding of human emotions,” Dr. Ferris mutters.

“I get that that’s the most efficient way,” Jeff says to him. “Genetically. But Sam’s here because there’s more to it than that. Like it or not, people – other people,” he amends, waving a hand at Misha, “are going to bring emotions and personal wants. Things like love. Jealousy. Sexual attraction. To a certain extent, we can engineer around that, using IVF, and you’re right, most of the colonists will understand and probably won’t object to raising kids that aren’t always genetically theirs. So we won’t need the full complement that Sam suggests.”

“But you’ll need more than fifty or sixty,” Dr. Ferris says.

“I’m gonna go with a hundred,” Jeff says. “It’s a nice round number. Sounds solid.”

Misha blinks. He feels like melodramatically thumping his head on the table. “You mean to say that after all my calculations and her…”

“Science,” Dr. Ferris interjects, “it’s okay, you can admit it.”

“… _theories,_ you’re picking a number because it _sounds_ good?”

Jeff fixes him with a steady look. “I am choosing a number, out of the range you two have offered me, that is sustainable, possible, and has good PR value. Someone’s got to sell it to the investors.”

“One hundred,” Claire says dreamily. “A century. The Next Century.”

“See?” says Jeff. “Good PR value. Now, make it so.”

 

  


 

The ads hit everywhere at once: billboards, net, even print media.

Most of Jared’s friends watch the newsfeeds and discuss it with mild interest. It’s something that’s happening to other people: crazy people who don’t mind leaving everything they’ve ever known and starting over in a lonely, potentially hostile, alien environment.

Jared doesn’t think those people are crazy. They’re adventurers, visionaries, pioneers.

He watches the list of desired professions scroll across the screen. Xenobiologists. Computer scientists. Agricultural and terraforming experts.

It’s exactly what he’s dreamed of, and exactly what his career so far has prepared him for.

Most people who go into agricultural biology have some personal connection to farming. Jared hadn’t grown up on a farm, but he vividly remembered the food shortages due to drought that marked his early childhood. In his second year biology class, he’d come across a paper on drought resistance that gave him ideas, while in his bioethics elective he’d had endless arguments about the risks and benefits of GMOs and their effects on the environment.

He’d ended up doing his PhD thesis on gene transfer in barley in a way that wouldn’t transfer to offspring – in direct contrast to the way the mod works – and so wouldn’t risk contaminating natural gene pools. He was lucky: this turned out to be a really hot topic right around the time he defended. His supervisor, Dr. Beaver, who’d been either actively ridiculed or politely ignored by most of the big names in the field, was suddenly in high demand as a consultant for industrial agriculture. Their papers, based on Jared’s thesis, were accepted to the good journals. And Jared was offered a job at Futura BioTech.

Futura’s a relative upstart in the biotechnology field. It has a reputation for integrity and innovation, and it has great employee benefits. Most of its employees are young, and Jared suspects its workforce has a much higher percentage of mods than the general population. He’s pretty sure that Danneel, who works in the plant science division in the lab next to his, is one. He thinks Tom might be too. And he knows for a fact about Jensen, a chemical engineer in the pesticide and fertilizer division and the most perfect man Jared’s ever seen.

When Jared gets home, there’s a flyer in his mail tray.

 _Build the Next Century_ , it says, in exciting blocky text against a background shot of space with a thin rim of light glowing around the edge of a planet. _Join the Crew._

He kicks off his shoes, flops on the sofa and reads through the glossy pamphlet.

_Do you have what it takes to be part of the next great pioneering leap for humanity?_

It describes the target planet, Mirna, in glowing terms, and outlines the plans for the world’s first major space colonization mission.

_Applications are now being accepted at M-Gen Corporation. Qualified individuals who pass the rigorous physical, mental and psychological testing process, and who have the skills required for a mission of this magnitude, will be invited to join the voyage of a lifetime._

A more extensive list of professions is outlined: biologists, medical doctors, miners, construction crew, pilots. A couple of psychologists. Engineers, computer techs. Biologists. Experience in terraforming, agriculture, and GMOs a plus.

_Applicants must be adaptable and flexible, willing to undertake both highly specialized work, and the day-to-day tasks required to construct and run a settlement._

Jared reads it with a growing sense of wonder. They’re talking about him.

Except for the little detail of his genetic code.

_Due to the pioneering nature of this project and the potential to encounter extreme conditions, only applications from genetically modified persons will be considered._

Jared’s been ineligible ever since he was born.

He’s still staring at the far wall, lost in thought, when the door flies open with a bang and Chad walks in.

“Dude, learn to knock,” Jared says.

Chad shrugs. “Don’t want people walking in, you should lock the door. What are we doing tonight?”

“Dunno.” Jared sighs and throws the pamphlet on the coffee table. “I haven’t even eaten yet.”

“You work too hard,” Chad advises, dropping onto the other end of the sofa. “It’s not healthy. Even for someone like you.”

Jared doesn’t react to that. Shortly after they met, Chad had come to the conclusion that Jared was a mod – _I’ve seen you with your shirt off, fucker_ – and he’s been needling him for a while now, trying to get Jared to confirm or deny it.

“What’s that about?” Chad says, pointing to the pamphlet in Jared’s lap. Jared hands it over without a word.

“Space?” Chad says incredulously, after reading the front. “Seriously, dude?”

Jared shrugs. “I’ve always wanted to go. You know that.”

“I know you’ve talked about it. I didn’t think you were serious.”

“It’d be the adventure of a lifetime!” Jared spreads his hands. “I can’t think of anything cooler.”

“Wow, you’ve really swallowed their propaganda,” Chad snorts. “You’re talking about being thrown into a deadly vacuum, with only a tin can between you and frozen suffocated death, until you get to an alien planet where something horrible will crawl inside you and eat your brain. Cool is not the word I’d have gone with.”

“This is reality, Chad. Not the movies.”

Chad ignores him. “Hey, there’s a bit here on ‘Reproduction’!” He reads it to himself, squints, and reads it again with a frown of confusion. Jared smothers a smirk, remembering the paragraph in question; it’s probably not what Chad expected.

_“Given that the colony will ultimately succeed by establishing a stable breeding population, M-Gen Corporation reserve the right to pick a relative balance of genetic males and females. Fertility is not an absolute requirement, but applicants should understand that the colony has an interest in becoming self-sustaining, which means that willingness to reproduce is a positive trait. The M-Gen geneticist will provide input on favorable mating combinations. Artificial insemination and IVF will be available, to allow for variation and to avoid inbreeding as much as possible, without disrupting social and romantic partnerships.”_

“They want as much genetic mixing as possible,” Jared explains. “Ideally, there wouldn’t be any kids in the same generation with the same set of parents. But they also don’t want people getting upset over their partners having sex with other people – unless everyone involves wants to, of course – so they have to offer IVF as an option.”

“So you can knock up anyone you want to, as long her boyfriend’s cool with it?” Chad huffs and throws the brochure on the coffee table. “And it’s wasted on you. Damn.”

“Yeah, but it also avoids any conflict with the anti-discrimination laws,” Jared points out. “They can’t ban gay people from the program, but every non-breeder they have along reduces the number of possible genetic configurations – unless you use IVF. This way, everyone’s genes can be used, including gay people and women who don’t want to or can’t go through a pregnancy. As long as enough women agree to carry the kids.”

“Wouldn’t that bother you? It’s like, you gotta agree to be a sperm donor or they won’t take you along?”

“I don’t have a problem with it,” Jared shrugs. “Don’t forget, I’m a geneticist. Plant breeding has some of the same issues. I can see their point, you know? There’s a limited number of places on the ship, and there won’t be a whole lot of back and forth travel for years, until they develop cheaper hyperdrive tech. The colony’s got the best chance of establishing itself as a stable, self-propagating organism if it’s got a wide genetic pool.”

“Still seems weird,” Chad says. “Like, you gotta have kids if you’re gonna come along on this trip.”

“Just because I’m gay doesn’t mean I never want kids. Kids are awesome.” Jared thinks of his nephew and smiles, as he always does. “This would actually make it easier. I’d get matched up with a donor mom, and I wouldn’t have to pay some crazy fee, or worry about her running off with the kid, or anything.”

“No, all you have to do is leave your friends and family behind and risk your life on an alien planet.” Chad shakes his head. “I cannot believe you would seriously consider this.”

Jared looks helplessly at Chad. Chad’s been his best friend for years, heard all Jared’s ramblings and dreams of going into space. If he can’t make Chad understand, how can he explain it to anyone else?

“I don’t get it,” Chad says. “I don’t have to. I guess this is your thing, dude, and I’ll be happy for you if you get the chance. But I still don’t get it.” He coughs. “And I’ll miss you.”

Jared can’t speak past the lump in his throat. He scoops Chad into a hug and pounds him on the back.

 

  


 

Jared and Jensen had met at a company event, some crazy team-building exercise that involved a lot of running around with brightly colored balloons, and Jared was rendered uncharacteristically speechless by his instant attraction to Jensen. Jared’s always been prone to sudden, devastating crushes. He hasn’t found true love so far, but he hasn’t been terminally damaged either, and still hasn’t given up hope.

Later that evening, he was rendered literally speechless, choking on his beer when Genevieve told him Jensen was a mod.

He’d always thought he’d be able to tell, somehow. He knows how it works; despite the editorial cartoons, he hadn’t actually expected someone evil, with little horns or green skin. He’s a molecular biologist himself, after all – but maybe that’s why deep down, he’d always figured he’d know.

Mind you, his gaydar generally sucks too.

Jensen was just… Jensen. A regular guy. Okay, so yes, one of the most desirable men Jared’s ever met, with those _eyes_ , and that smile, and those hands. Even his little imperfections are gorgeous, the bowlegs and freckles only making him sexier.

…Okay, so maybe it should have been obvious after all. Jared was still surprised. He wondered how many people he’d been friends or colleagues with over the years might have been mods, and he’d never known.

Jensen has a reputation for being kind of a dick, but it’s mostly that he doesn’t bullshit, he doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and he generally doesn’t give a shit what people say about him. There are a few people he genuinely respects, and for them he’ll work his ass off (and, occasionally, consider the possibility he might be wrong, or at least misinformed), but otherwise you better have your facts straight and your work done when you go talk to Jensen.

Jared encounters Jensen again a few days later in the elevator. Jensen asks if Nick is always a jackass, and Jared agrees he is. They grin at each other, and when Jensen shows up in Jared’s lab later in the afternoon, Jared sticks his rack of samples in the freezer and accepts the invitation to get coffee.

It’s the start of a firm friendship, solidified when Jared fixes the coffee machine in the central employee lounge. They go out after work at least once a week for food and a few beers. Jared’s had Jensen round to watch basketball a couple of times, although mostly they go to Jensen’s because he’s got a bigger screen.

There’s just one fly in the ointment.

They’d known each other for a few weeks, when they met up for lunch, sitting outside at one of the picnic tables in the park down the street from Futura.

“We should have invited Gabe,” Jared said. “He needs to get out more.”

“Dude,” Jensen had said. “Seriously? Gabe’s a natural.”

Jared was, once again, speechless – and would have been even if his mouth wasn’t stuffed full of sandwich.

“It’s cool that you’re nice to them,” Jensen went on. “But you should watch it. They’re not like us, and they won’t stick up for you when it counts. They don’t like us, not really.”

Jared swallowed his sandwich and tried. “You don’t really think that? Gabe’s a good guy.”

“Oh, sure,” Jensen said. “It’s not their fault they’re limited. I get that they hate us because we’re better than them, but it still means you can’t trust them.”

“I don’t think I’m better than them,” Jared said, slowly.

“Of course you are.” Jensen gestured with his apple. “Mods are the future. The naturals know that intellectually, it’s why they mod their kids, but they don’t really get it. They were born the way they are and they’ve never known anything different.”

“Neither have – ” _you_ , Jared nearly said, but hesitated. “Neither have mods. Do you really think we’re so different?”

 _You and me,_ he was thinking, but he knew Jensen was thinking, _us and them._ No wonder Jensen hadn’t made any friends in his own division; Jared’s pretty sure most of his immediate colleagues aren’t GMPs. And no wonder he chose Danneel and Jared to hang out with.

Lots of people Jared’s met over the years have assumed he’s a mod. He’s tall, reasonably good-looking, and he works hard to stay in top shape. He’s maybe not as smart as Jensen, but he’s above the curve. A lot of people look at him and assume it all came easy.

In his darker moments, it pisses the hell out of him. He’s worked hard for what he has – his muscles, his PhD – and to have people assume it all comes out of a tube makes him seethe.

Other times, he’s beyond grateful for what he’s got. Sure, he’s worked hard, but he was given opportunity, education and support, and he’s got good genes even if they haven’t been tweaked. Millions of people the world over aren’t so lucky.

Most of the time, though, he doesn’t think about it much.

“Yeah,” Jensen had said. “I really do.”

They’d finished their lunch without further conversation, and walked back to the labs.

Jared had intended to tell Jensen the truth. But the Futura lobby seems a bad place, and so does the break room, and when he next invites Jensen over to his place, he can’t bring himself to tell him. Because that would be the end of their friendship, and the end of the faint, insane hope Jared had had of one day asking Jensen out on an actual date.

He figures, maybe if they spend enough time together, he can influence Jensen. Maybe he can get him over his bias against normal humans.

Because except for that prejudice, Jensen is pretty much perfect. A bit grumpy without his coffee, and very particular about order (Jared wonders if Jensen would have had full-on OCD if the mod hadn’t worked its magic on him), but again, these aren’t so much flaws as personality quirks that have their own appeal and throw his general perfection into stark relief.

Every day, he promises himself he’ll tell Jensen. One of these days. Just, not today.

 

[Part Two](http://electricalgwen.livejournal.com/105255.html)


	2. SPN J2 AU Fic: Inclusions (2/4)

  


 

Jensen had pretty much decided to apply for the colony mission the minute he saw the first ad.

Even if he didn’t want to, he’d feel a certain pressure to go. There aren’t _that_ many mods yet. The numbers are growing each year, but fourteen-year-olds aren’t going to be sent off to a new planet. Those of Jensen’s age are going to be first.

Jensen’s had the dubious distinction of being among the first all his life: the first to be born, the first to fight to enter schools, the first to be banned from track and field meets, the first to get sidelong looks and mutters on the skyrail. The first wave of mods brought in a whole host of complications that everyone had vaguely anticipated but didn’t plan for, only reacted to. Very quickly, mods learned that it was often a good idea to keep their mouths shut about what they were.

Beautiful people, the all-stars, the winners: they’ve always been envied by those who want what they have. There’s always been resentment, name-calling, an attempt to knock the golden boys and girls off their pedestal. Popular insults these days include riffs on the official term “genetically modified persons”.

_“Keep your shirt on, precious.”_

Precious is one of the politer insults. Legally, they’re termed “genetically modified persons.” That being a mouthful, short forms rapidly developed, with the most common being GMP and GM – also known as “gimps” or “gems.” “Precious gems” became a standard taunt or dismissal for mods who were perceived, rightly or wrongly, to have an inflated sense of self-worth or entitlement.

The legal fights are mostly over. Public acceptance, that’s a different story, and maybe it’s never going to change, but Jensen doesn’t really care. People talk shit about him, whatever. If they didn’t do it because he was modded, they’d do it because he’s gay, or because he likes jazz, or because he demands his subordinates do their damn jobs. Whatever.

He wants to leave.

Some of his friends can’t understand how he could even consider it. How he could break all his ties to Earth. He’s used to breaking those, though. He left home after one too many arguments about religion with his parents. They chose to modify him, and they didn’t like the result.

His mom’s never actually come out and said it, but he knows she feels responsible for his being gay. She did something wicked, to herself and her unborn child, and that was the punishment. His father …

They can’t help it. It’s not their fault they don’t have his superior intelligence. But Jensen was never able to take their superstitions seriously, and it frustrates him that even with their basic brains they can’t see the logical fallacies.

Plus, Danneel says Jared’s going to apply.

Jensen’s annoyed at himself for thinking like that, because it’s not like he’s some teenager in a Romeo and Juliet story, ready to run away and die for his true love. He’s been through enough shit to know how the world works; crushes fade, people are selfish, and love is fucking _hard._ If it even exists. He and Jared are friends – pretty good friends, even – but that’s all.

Still. Jensen would defy the most jaded heart not to find Jared appealing. Even Danneel admits Jared is hot and sweet and made of rainbows, and Danneel is a tough person to impress.

He knew Jared was modified, although Jared never actually said. You just had to look at him: tall, muscled, blinding smile, dimples. Even his little imperfections were appealing, like the mole that Jensen wants to lick, and the odd multi-colored eyes. He’s smart, too: he’d been one of the most sought-after PhD grads of his year, and is apparently doing great things with disease resistance in Futura’s plant science division.

Jared never actually admits to it publicly, but then, Jared’s younger than he is. Not much, but enough that he would have been brought up not to advertise himself – and old enough not to be part of today’s ‘recognition’ movement. He’d been born in Texas, but that didn’t mean a thing; so was Jensen himself. Texas doesn’t officially modify, but there was always the out-of-state option.

Jared knew that _he’s_ a mod – probably knew it even before they met. It’s not like Jensen makes any secret of it, and company gossip is much the same everywhere. Right from day one, he’d never made any remarks or treated Jensen any different than everyone else. He had to be a mod. Still, Jensen had found himself holding back, habit born of too many hurtful words and actions. He’s been with non-mods before and it doesn’t work out well.

But when he finds out Jared’s applying to the Mirna colonization project, he does a little fistpump. That’s all the confirmation he needs.

 

  


 

Jared’s cleaning up after jerking off in the shower one morning, when he gets the idea for a completely insane plan.

He’d been having a particularly good fantasy involving Jensen on his knees, water slicking his hair into spikes and glistening in droplets on his eyelashes as he looks up at Jared with his mouth stretched around Jared’s fat cock. As usual, in no time at all, that had him coming hard enough to paint the tile halfway up the wall.

He slumps against the wall, panting. The water is overly hot on his skin and he feels lightheaded. He steps as far out of the spray as the cramped shower stall will allow and turns, scrubbing one foot idly back and forth on the floor, pushing a couple of splashes of come towards the drain. The pearlescent goo swirls in the water, washing away and disappearing. Globs of his useless, unmodified DNA.

That’s when it hits him.

What he needs, is somebody _else’s_ DNA.

He’s still thinking about that later in the morning, when Jensen ambushes him by the coffee maker.

“I’m going away next week, and I need someone to look after my apartment. Would you mind, man? I pay in beer and steaks.”

“Sure,” Jared says.

It’s fate, clearly: this opportunity dropped in his lap at this particular moment.

“Awesome,” Jensen says. “I’ll give you the keycode. Never thought I’d have someone with so many degrees in plant biology looking after my houseplants. I don’t have many, but I’d rather they didn’t die.”

“Don’t worry,” Jared says. “I’m very trustworthy.”

When he burns his tongue on his coffee, he figures it’s appropriate penance for the lie.

 

  


 

Jared punches in the code. The light turns green and he pushes the apartment door open.

He’s been here many times, but as he steps in and the door closes behind him, he feels like an intruder. He finds himself treading softly, holding his breath, as if somehow the secret purpose of his visit will leave traces in the air.

There’s a small pile of mail in the tray under the delivery tube. He clears it out and places it on the kitchen counter. There’s an orange envelope from Jensen’s sister Mack, a padded envelope from a computing parts supplier, and a package from a mail-order sock company.

He waters the plants and wanders around the apartment with a vague sense of making sure everything is okay: windows shut, stove off, thermostat down. He knows it’s all fine; there’s no way Jensen would have left it anything but perfect.

“Quit stalling,” he mutters to himself, and heads for the bathroom.

It’s as neat as the rest of the place, sink shining, mirror spotless. There’s no glass beside the sink – _dishwasher,_ Jared thinks, but thanks to his procrastinating tactic, he already knows the dishwasher was started on a clean-and-sanitize cycle before Jensen left. Jensen’s toothbrush is gone from its holder. The bathroom garbage can has been emptied: no bloody tissue paper scraps from shaving mishaps, no Kleenex. Even the towels look unused.

Jared blows out a breath through his teeth and looks around for the laundry hamper. Maybe Jensen did laundry right before he left too, but Jared would bet he did it at least a day in advance so all the clothes on his neatly written packing list would be ready.

No hamper. _Figures,_ he thinks.

Jensen’s bedroom smells like his aftershave, with a hint of fabric softener. The bed looks freshly made with clean sheets and duvet cover. The closet door is open and there’s a laundry basket containing the previous sheets, with a couple of towels thrown on top.

Despite knowing he’s alone, Jared’s pulse rate picks up and his palms sweat. Not only is what he’s planning completely illegal, but this is the bit where he gets to act like a creepy stalker. He feels ridiculously self-conscious as he reaches into his inner jacket pocket and pulls out the sealed, sterile packages. One contains a small plastic cell scraper, another some microcentrifuge tubes, and the last, a pair of vinyl gloves.

He peels open the packets, laying them out on the bed, and pulls on the gloves. The sterility isn’t important; what is important is that he hasn’t handled the outsides of them, contaminating them with his DNA.

The way the mod works is, there’s a specific promoter sequence: a string of DNA that triggers the cell’s mechanism for alteration of gene expression. There’s also a confidential, proprietary string of DNA that doesn’t actually do anything except act as an identifier: the combination of the string and promoter doesn’t exist anywhere else. If that sequence shows up in a genetic test, the person’s a mod.

If he can make DNA that contains that sequence, and pass it off as his own… _he_ can pass as a mod.

He picks up the tiny sample tube and scraper, and goes over to the laundry basket.

He doesn’t need much: some skin cells, a couple of hair follicles. The crime labs say they can make an ID on as few as five or ten skin cells; given that he’s doing this with his kitchen counter equipment, Jared’s going to need a little more material to start with, but he figures he should be able to get what he needs.

The towels on top should be a good source of skin cells, but they’re also quite fluffy; it’d be easier to see and scrape skin cells off the sheets. Pillowcases are probably his best bet. He removes the towels and drops them on the floor, and begins pulling up the mass of sheets, shaking them gently to see if a pillowcase falls out.

It doesn’t. But a T-shirt does, and Jared sucks in a startled breath, because it’s crumpled and smeared with dried, white streaks.

He turns involuntarily and looks at the bed, and he can almost see Jensen there, naked, eyes closed, head arched back and heels digging into the mattress as he jacks his goddamn perfect genetically enhanced dick until he shoots all over his beautiful belly.

And then wipes up puddles of modified DNA with a worn T-shirt, which he throws in the laundry for Jared to find. _Jackpot._

Jared’s half-hard in his jeans already. He feels like even more of a perverted creeper; he’s going through the guy’s laundry and getting turned on by it, for fuck’s sake. But he can’t seem to turn off his brain, which keeps supplying him with ever more detailed and inventive scenes of Jensen masturbating. He wonders if he likes it fast and rough or slow and teasing, what he fantasizes about, if he likes to reach down to play with his balls.

He curses and presses a hand to his own crotch, where his dick is now straining uncomfortably against his fly. _Get on with it, and get OUT._

Squatting down presses his erection even more firmly against the line of his zipper, but he grits his teeth and ignores it, rapidly scraping several flakes of white into the tube.

He flips the lid closed and presses it down firmly, then tucks it in his pocket. He replaces the laundry in the basket, shoving the T-shirt down into the depths, and leaves Jensen’s room. He tiptoes, even though there’s nobody there to hear.

 

  


 

He’s got his sample. Now to make use of it.

Before he started working at Futura, he used to do a lot more kitchen biohacking. He still has his home-built gel box and half a package of the clear plastic straws he used for sequencing. Thermal cyclers are expensive, though, so he always used to do his amplification steps at work or in Chad’s garage.

As a result, he’s going to have to do his DNA amplification at work. He often stays late. It shouldn’t attract any undue attention.

He’s glad he’s doing some pretty routine stuff today. His concentration is shitty and he keeps having to double-check that he set the timer, or added the right solution. Five o’clock feels like it takes forever to come, but it gets there eventually.

“Hey, Jay.” Genevieve stops beside his bench. “We’re heading to Ike’s for pizza. Wanna come?”

“Thanks, but I’ll be staying late,” he says without looking up. Micropipetting doesn’t take a lot of brainpower, but you do have to keep paying attention. “Got a gel I need to finish running.”

“You work too hard.” Genevieve’s their unofficial social coordinator. Jared only goes out with the lab gang once every couple of months, but that doesn’t deter her from asking.

“He likes it,” Danneel says. “Just don’t leave your dirty glassware in my sink.”

This is unfair. Jared always cleans up after himself. Well, nearly always.

“Have fun, guys,” he says, moving on to the next line of samples. “See you tomorrow.”

He finishes adding buffer, then loads all his samples into the sequencer. The rest of the process will run automatically. Normally, he’d go get a coffee now, or play some video game until the timer goes off – during the day, he uses the downtime to read articles, keep up to date in his field, but he figures he’s allowed to goof off after hours.

Instead, tonight, he pulls the little tube out of his pocket and sets it in the rack. He’s got all the supplies out already; he’s been doing DNA extraction and PCR amplification all afternoon, on more legitimate targets.

Lysis buffer goes in first, and he sets the timer for twenty minutes. There’s a lot of waiting around in molecular biology.

For the next couple of hours he alternates between checking on his sequencing gel, and working on the Jensen sample.

He doesn’t actually have to sequence Jensen’s DNA. All he needs to do is make a lot more of it, which is going to take a few hours, and a bit of luck.

The check will presumably be done using sequence-specific PCR: using a primer that targets the mod sequence, to selectively amplify that piece of DNA. Since the mod promoter is still copyrighted, Jared doesn’t have access to the primer for that, so he’ll have to do a general amplification of all the DNA in the tube. Technically, this isn’t a big problem: he can use multiple primers that should pick up a whole variety of different DNA sequences, but it’s still possible – unlikely, but possible – that the mod sequence is in a stretch of DNA that doesn’t get amplified.

Plus, if the mod sequence includes something like a “stop transcription” region that makes it impossible to amplify using conventional technique, then this isn’t going to work.

There’s no way for Jared to know that for sure, though, and he guesses that it probably doesn’t. Mods can still commit crimes, after all. Law enforcement wouldn’t be happy about criminals who can’t be identified using standard DNA techniques, so it’s unlikely the mod sequence is protected against this unless the makers snuck something past government.

He’s pretty sure that the mod test is only interested in the presence or absence of the promoter band. They’re not looking at any other genes, so nobody’s going to notice that this isn’t his DNA. It’s fortunate, though, that he and Jensen have relatively similar traits, on a macroscopic level: male, tall, European ancestry.

The final timer beeps. Jared pulls out the tiny tube and holds it up to the light. Essence of Jensen, concentrated.

Perfect.

 

  


 

That weekend, he fills out his application form online.

The first thing that makes his stomach turn over is having to provide his parents’ names. It’s a matter of public record, of course, but he hadn’t expected to see it right there on the form, the first step of the massive lie he’s trying to tell.

He fills in the names. They can’t check his mom’s medical records without her consent. He isn’t on record as being a mod, but many aren’t, especially mods his age.

The rest is pretty straightforward. They ask about education and work history, scholarships and awards, extracurricular activities, languages spoken. He has to upload scanned copies of his diplomas and his CV, and provide five names of references.

He ticks the box that certifies he’s a GMP. Then the one that certifies that he has read over his entire application and everything is true to the best of his knowledge.

He hesitates only momentarily, biting his lip, before clicking _submit._

An acknowledgment appears on screen, notifying him that a confirmation email has been sent and that he should expect to hear within the next couple of weeks.

He goes out for a run. A long one, where he pushes himself harder and harder until he can’t think of anything but one foot in front of the other.

When he gets home, he has a quick shower, downs half a carton of orange juice, and calls his parents to tell them he’s applying.

His mom sounds confused.

“But I thought they were only accepting applications from GMPs?”

“Yeah,” Jared says. “That’s true. But I…” he takes a deep breath. “Mom, I really want to do this. I know what the problem is, and I figured that… I’m gonna try my luck.”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line. Jared holds his breath. His momma is a smart lady.

“Oh, honey,” she says. “If you think this is the right thing for you to do… then you give it your best shot.”

Jared’s pretty sure she understands, but he feels the need to ask. “If they call…”

“Don’t worry,” she says tartly. “It’s still illegal here. I’m not saying a thing.”

Oh god, he loves her.

“Mom – ” he says, and his voice cracks. “I… you know I love you guys.” The last thing he wants is them thinking that he doesn’t value his ties on Earth.

“I love you, baby,” she says, and her own voice is thick with tears. “I’ll be so sad if you go, but I’ll be heartbroken for your sake if you can’t.”

 

  


 

Two weeks later, he tells the lab he’s taking the afternoon off, being vague about his reasons why, and now he’s sitting in a small clinic room with no windows on the fifth floor of M-Gen’s research facility. The technician who’s measured his height, weight and blood pressure, and taken a few tubes of blood, is writing something in his chart.

This is ridiculous. He feels like he’s in a spy movie, about to bite down on his hidden cyanide pill.

He’s got a small gel capsule filled with the concentrated extract of Jensen’s DNA tucked between his right cheek and an upper back molar. The plan is to scratch at his cheek – he deliberately didn’t shave for the last couple of days, so he’s got some good stubble going – and crush it right before the sampling, allowing the liquid it contains to flow down along the inside of his cheek. He has to time it right: too early and it’ll wash away or degrade in his saliva. There’s bound to be a little bit of Jared’s own DNA in the sample they get anyway, but as long as there’s an overwhelming amount of Jensen’s, that will dominate the amplification and sequencing. Too much of Jared’s, though, and the mod promoter band will be suspiciously weak.

However, he hadn’t thought about the layout of the room. The tech’s right-handed, and unfortunately he’s sitting to Jared’s right. Odds are, he’s going to swipe the left cheek, which means Jared needs to move the capsule.

“Next, we just need a cheek swab,” the tech says. He looks down for a brief moment as he opens the peel-packet containing the swab and its container. Jared takes that opportunity to flick his tongue up and retrieve the capsule. He pushes it to the left side of his mouth and tries to poke it up beside his upper teeth, but it keeps falling down.

The tech holds up the swab. “Okay, open up.”

Jared’s out of time. He bites down and feels the capsule pop, squirting liquid sideways in both directions, against his cheek but also his tongue.

He opens his mouth slowly, and by some miracle manages to sweep the empty capsule down and hold it under his tongue as the tech reaches in and wipes the swab along the inside of his left cheek. He rolls it slightly as it goes; Jared knows this is to dislodge cells, get a better sample.

He has no idea if there was enough of the substitute DNA on his cheek to fool the test. He has no idea if this will work anyway. He must be certifiably insane.

“That’s it,” the tech says. He pushes the swab into the collection tube, pulls out the handle and snaps the tube shut.

Jared gulps, then coughs. Hopefully the tech will write this off as nerves. Actually, the capsule remnants he was trying to swallow are sticking in his dry throat.

“That’s everything for today?” he croaks.

“Yeah,” the tech says, sticking a label on Jared’s tube and placing it in a rack with dozens of others. “You’ll get an answer next Thursday.”

His tone is disinterested.

“Great,” Jared says, still a little hoarse. “Uh, thanks. See you.”

“Right,” the tech says, already pulling a new set of barcoded labels out of the printer for the next candidate.

He manages to forget about it for minutes at a time, even hours, over the next week, although he does screw up a whole batch of cell cultures and has to scrap them. By Thursday he’s a ball of nerves. He can’t concentrate all morning, and at eleven a.m. finally bolts to the coffee shop down the street. He keeps frantically refreshing his email, hoping to see one from Mission Control.

He kept to decaf, but by the time noon comes his knee is jittering uncontrollably. Even if the DNA trick worked, there are still a thousand reasons he could be rejected. Maybe his test answers sucked. Maybe they had a zillion highly qualified agricultural biologists apply, and what they really need is a linguistics major or a crane operator.

His phone is lying in front of him, lined up with the checkerboard pattern inlaid in the table top. Every few minutes, he reaches out and adjusts it. It’s never quite perfect.

His hand is hovering over it again when it gives a faint buzz.

He snatches it up, taps in the passcode with shaking fingers, and there it is in his inbox, an email from the space program. Highlighted in red: high priority.

He stares at it a moment, mind a complete blank, then opens it.

_Dear Mr. Padalecki,_

_Thank you for applying to be a Mirna colonist. We are pleased to inform you that your application has been short-listed._

_Further testing will take place beginning Monday at 8 a.m. Please confirm your acceptance of this offer no later than this Friday. You will be required to be present for about six hours._

_Please bring suitable attire for the physical fitness and endurance portion of the tests._

He passed.

He _passed._

Whatever other tests they throw at him, he doesn’t care. He’ll study, he’ll work out, he’ll ace them all. He’s going to the _stars._

He’s got to ask for time off next week, with only a few days notice. His boss isn’t going to be happy, but Jared is beyond thrilled in this moment.

 

  


 

‘Further testing’, he finds out, means a whole _hell_ of a lot more testing.

He spends the first couple of hours filling in little ovals on psychometric questionnaires, and then runs, balances, lifts weights, even stands on his head. He’s put in a gyroscope and flipped in all directions. He’s measured, weighed, and hooked up to various machines that assess cardiac rhythm, grip strength, body fat, oxygen levels, bone density… he loses track. They could be assessing serum porcelain or sperm count by the end of it for all he knows.

They take so many vials of blood that Jared’s surprised he can still sit upright, and they don’t even have any cookies and milk for afterwards.

“Another one?” he says disbelievingly, as the nurse deftly swaps the tubes one-handed. “Why do you need so many?”

“Different tests need different conditions.” She pulls off the light-blue capped tube and slides a brown-capped one onto the needle. “The tubes have different preservatives and stuff in them.”

“What are they all for?”

“Oh, lots of things. Blood type, sugar, iron, cholesterol, liver and kidney function, all the basics. Then things like hormone levels and immune status.” She considers, staring at the rows of tubes lined up in the rack. “Baseline toxin exposures. And of course, you all get a complete genotype.”

Jared starts.

“Hold still!” She grabs his arm as it jerks, before the needle can pull out. “What’s wrong?”

“It, uh, it hurt. I think maybe the needle moved a bit.”

She tuts and adjusts it slightly; _now_ it hurts, but Jared forces a smile. “Yeah, that’s better. Thanks.”

“Only three tubes left to go.”

“Great.” He deliberately relaxes his muscles and tries to slow his breathing, though his heart is pounding. “So, uh, you were saying. We get genotyped?”

“Oh, yeah.” She nods. “They didn’t do the whole thing on your application sample. That would have wasted too much time. You would not believe the number of applicants. And some of them weren’t even mods! I don’t know how they thought they could get by the test.”

“Crazy,” Jared grits out.

“But they need your full genome sequenced, of course. The mod clears you of any nasty recessive disease genes, but you’ll still need to avoid inbreeding. That’s how they’ll figure out the best combinations.”

“Combinations?”

“For children.” She gives him a politely dubious look. “You did read the infopacket, right?”

“Yeah. I just… I guess I hadn’t really thought about it much.”

“All done.” She pops a cotton ball on his arm and slides the needle out, pushing down hard and ignoring his unmanly yelp. “Hold that for sixty seconds.”

She slides the whole rack of tubes into a foam-padded delivery capsule, clicks it shut and walks over to the launcher. Jared watches her, panicked. He can’t see any way out of this. His blood’s about to head off to the lab in the delivery system, and once it does, he’s sunk. But he can’t really object. They’re not going to keep him on board if he refuses testing, plus that’d look horribly suspicious in itself.

He’s screwed either way.

The lab will have the newest nanopore sequencers. It’ll take them fifteen minutes at the outside to run the genotype. His samples will be in line with everyone else’s, though; there’s no reason they’d view any of this bloodwork as urgent. Maybe they’ll stick it in the fridge, run it tomorrow.

The capsule disappears up the delivery tube.

Or maybe they’ll come for him within the hour.

He’s not sure what the punishment is for impersonating a mod, or even if there is one. As far as he knows, nobody’s managed it before.

They’ll probably run the sample a second time to make sure it’s not an error. Maybe recalibrate the machine. That’ll take an extra half hour or so.

He needs to leave. Now. He’s not going to Mirna, and he doesn’t need to stay and find out what they think they should do with him. He’ll tell the guys at the gate he needs to go do something urgent with his cell cultures or something.

She comes back over. “Let me see that?”

She pulls off the cotton ball, nods approvingly at the lack of bleeding, and sticks a small round band-aid over the spot. “There you go.”

If he’s lucky, they’ll let him go, just say he didn’t pass the more intensive testing. But Jared thinks that if he were them, he’d want to know how someone beat the screening test, and he’d be pretty interested in tracking down the person who did it for a nice long chat. And, it hits him, this isn’t just M-Gen’s project. This is a government operation. Maybe he shouldn’t go home. He could probably stay with Chad for a day or two, figure out what to do.

Maybe he shouldn’t stay at Chad’s. Maybe he should get the hell out of Dodge.

“Can I go now?” he says, standing up. “I feel fine.”

“Go? No.” She frowns. “Didn’t you read _anything_ we gave you? Imaging is next. Through that door. Get changed into a gown, and take a seat in the waiting area. You can leave your stuff in one of the lockers.”

“Couldn’t I maybe do that later?” he says, trying to keep the desperation out of his voice. “I just lost a lot of blood. What if I get dizzy?”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re fine. Besides, all you have to do is lie there. Get a move on, you’re holding up the line.”

He is completely screwed.

He gets changed, feeling even more naked and vulnerable than usual in a hospital gown made for someone half his size.

The MRI scan, full body and brain, takes forty minutes. Every so often, an automated voice advises him of the necessity to hold still. He lies immobile, hardly even breathing, staring numbly at the ceiling above him. The incessant banging of the magnet continually disrupts any thoughts he might have had.

“All done,” the technologist announces through the intercom. “You can get changed. Follow the blue signs to the exit.”

He does. What else is he going to do? Escape through the air vents?

Jeff Morgan himself is waiting by the exit. Jared recognizes him from his picture in the pamphlet, and the big-ass painting hanging in the main lobby.

“Jared!” he says. “Step in here?”

‘Here’ is a side room containing a desk, with a big squashy leather chair behind it and a modern, angular, thoroughly uncomfortable-looking chair in front of it. Jared perches awkwardly on it and wonders where the security guards are hiding.

Jeff drops into his chair and flips open a folder on the desk.

“Agricultural biologist, huh?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good test results,” Jeff says. “High adaptability scores. Very good reasoning and interpersonal skills. Oh, and you did surprisingly well on the EQ testing. Nice to see all those folks who said the mod would damage emotional intelligence proven wrong.”

Jared tries not to move a muscle. Jeff turns some more pages.

“And all your blood work came back fine.”

He taps the papers together, closes the file, and holds his hand out over the desk to Jared. “Congratulations. Welcome on board.”

 

  


 

Misha was running the sequences and the immunological tests, while Claire did the basic biochemistry, hematology, and toxicology.

He watched the next genome begin to stream past on the screen. If he gets in the right frame of mind, he can read the patterns as they go by, recognize familiar alleles like old friends. It’s a zen-like state; if he thinks too hard about it, he loses it and the pattern becomes an indecipherable mess of individual letters.

This is one of the things that makes him stand out at his job, this ability to see the form in the code. The techs have nicknamed him Neo. He knows this, even though nobody’s ever said it to his face.

He’s in the zone today. There’s rhodopsin, there’s one of the T-cell activators, there’s cilial function and the D3 receptor, there’s…

Misha blinks and sits up, abruptly thrown out of the zen mindset.

That’s where the mod should be. And it’s not there.

He scrolls back up the screen and starts reading through the sequence of chromosome 3 in detail. He’s merely skimmed the other samples, ensured that the sequencing worked. Occasionally he’d recognize a familiar sequence, but he hasn’t bothered to do any kind of indepth analysis. They’re all stored in the computer, and he’s got months before he needs to start working out appropriate genetic crosses, or analyzing possible reasons for someone’s unusual response to the new atmosphere.

He finishes reading that segment of chromosome, then switches to the summary and reads it line by line.

It’s a good, solid genome. No flaws.

But it isn’t modded.

He checks the name attached to the sample. _Padalecki, Jared._ He recognizes the name, but he needs to be sure.

“What’s up?” Claire says, when he heads over to the filing cabinet.

“Quality assurance,” Misha says. “I think they spelled this guy’s name wrong.”

“I can see why.”

Misha flips through the applicant files and finds the one he wants. He opens it and looks at the printed result of the screening test. Solidly positive.

It’s perfectly clear what the right thing to do is.

“No,” he says, putting the file back and wandering casually back to his desk, “it’s correct.”

“Mine are almost done.” Claire looks sidelong at him. “Do you mind watching them for a bit? If I don’t get coffee into me soon, I am not responsible for the consequences.”

“Heaven save us.” Misha waves a hand towards the door. “Go. Caffeinate.”

If he hadn’t already made up his mind, that would have clinched his decision. It’s fate, clearly.

He saves the sequence on the screen in front of him to a flash drive, deletes the original, then opens up a folder containing a number of genomes sequenced during his last project for Jeff – all mods. Some are no doubt applying for the Mirna project, but not all of them will be.

_That’s a good one._

He opens the file and scrolls through the genome. It resembles Padalecki’s enough that nobody’s going to notice – even someone with his pattern recognition abilities isn’t likely to pick up the relatively unimportant differences, and most people will only read the summary anyway – and it’s got the all-important mod. Plus, its owner is an art historian who is unlikely to apply for a job in pioneering, and wouldn’t pass the qualifications screen if he did.

He changes the name at the top to read “Padalecki, Jared”, and saves a copy under Padalecki’s ID. He prints the summary report and sticks Padalecki’s bar-coded label on it, then adds it to the pile of other reports, all of which are entirely and reassuringly normal.

 

  


 

Jared waits until he gets back to his apartment to freak the fuck out.

_What. The hell._

The mod doesn’t work on adults. Even kids. Everybody knows that.

Did the mix of primers he threw at Jensen’s DNA alter that somehow? Modify the mod? When he swallowed the amplified mix he made… did it get into him, _change_ him?

There’s no way. It would have broken down in his stomach, acids and enzymes chewing away at it. That’s why the mod treatment had to be injected: get into the bloodstream directly, bypassing the gut and all its destructive capacity.

He spends some time wondering and finally decides not to look a gift horse in the mouth. He passed, somehow, miraculously, and he’s going to Mirna.

And as soon as his lab is set up there, as soon as he’s got his space and his equipment and his late-night privacy, he’ll take a sample and find out what the hell he’s done to himself.

He looks in the mirror, assessing whether he can see any difference. His eyes are still the same indescribable color; he still has moles and a couple of small scars. He knows better – the mod isn’t going to change his outward appearance, not now it’s formed – but he still peers at the mirror, as if trying to see deeper, see what his blood and bones and organs reveal.

He _passed._

It’s one of the best days of his life.

The only thing that could make it better arrives two hours later, in the form of a text from Jensen.

_Guess where I’m going? Heard you might be too._

 

[Part Three](http://electricalgwen.livejournal.com/105640.html)


	3. SPN J2 AU Fic: Inclusions (3/4)

  


 

The next several weeks of training, lectures, first aid courses, emergency protocols, scheduling, and a million other details fly by in a blur. The hundred colonists barely have time to eat and learn each other’s names, let alone hang out and socialize. There’ll be time for that on the ship, Mission Control keeps telling them. They’ve all been tested, proven to be socially compatible. They’ll be fine.

When the day comes, it feels unreal.

After the tearful goodbyes, the solemnity of the launch, everyone’s subdued at first with the realization that this is actually happening. After a couple of days of quiet reflection, though, most of them are ready to come out of their cabins and be a little more extroverted: to hang out and start really getting to know the people they’re building a life with.

They’ll be conscious for nearly all of the voyage. It’s recommended that they be sedated and strapped in for the hyperjump itself, but that only accounts for a couple of hours out of the two-week-long voyage. Most of the time required is spent getting away from Earth, and, on the other end, approaching and landing on Mirna; they have to be far enough away that the hyperdrive won’t disturb anything.

Jensen spends those first couple of days staring out a hatch at the universe. He’d had no idea it would be so beautiful.

Thank god, because if it weren’t for the view, he’d be bored senseless. He’s memorized the assembly plans for his unit – hell, he _designed_ the modular assembly for his unit – and gone over every scheduling plan six times. There are no more chances for efficiency.

Everything’s perfect.

He hadn’t had any tearful goodbyes. He’s not sorry to be leaving Earth. The future’s looking bright. And the brightest thing in his orbit is Jared.

He joins the gatherings taking place around the ship, talks to other people, plays cards and has a drink (offering thanks to the mission psychologist, who had insisted that alcohol was an essential component of the supplies.) He likes everyone he meets – how could he not? They’re mods, his own species – but nobody comes close to Jared. So that’s that decided. Jared is, more literally than is usually meant by the phrase, the only man in the universe for him.

He considers waiting for Jared to make the first move, but after he catches a few other colonists, both male and female, making eyes at Jared, he decides he’d better stake his claim early.

Jared looks mildly surprised by Jensen appearing at his cabin door, but he also looks pleased, which gives Jensen the push he needs.

“I’m bored as hell,” he says. “Wanna fuck?”

They don’t see much outside of Jared’s cabin for the rest of the trip. Space is beautiful, but it goes on and on. They have better things to do.

“I didn’t expect this,” Jared says, a few days later, lying with his head on Jensen’s chest. They’re both sticky and exhausted.

“Good thing Mission Control drilled us to expect the unexpected.”

Jared laughs quietly. “I guess.”

“I knew you were applying,” Jensen says. “Danni told me.”

Jared rolls off Jensen, and props his head on his chin. “Really? You mean… that’s not why you applied. Right?”

“No,” Jensen says. “No, this was exactly the sort of opportunity I’d been wishing for. The chance to do something extraordinary. With a bunch of extraordinary people. Think how awesome it’s going to be, a whole civilization built by mods.”

He tickles Jared just below the ribs. “But you were the cherry on top.”

Jared’s frowning a little, looking like he might say something. But then Jensen tickles him a little harder and instead he lets out a strangled squawk and tackles Jensen to the bed, grabbing for his wrists, and apparently they aren’t so exhausted after all because things get heated and sticky again.

They have particular fun during the couple of hours of reduced gravity required in preparation for the hyperjump.

There had been some debate about whether to install artificial gravity in the ship. Given the short duration of the flight, and the cost of the grav unit, some questioned whether it was worth it. Others pointed out that while it was a short voyage by space travel standards, it was plenty long for a group of civilians who hadn’t been through astronaut training. The cost of training, and the cost of potential screw-ups by people who didn’t know how to function in zero-gravity, started to make the cost of a grav unit look reasonable.

When someone pointed out that the grav unit could be usefully repurposed in the physics lab, that clinched it.

Jensen’s just as glad. He’s never been in zero-gee, but he’s pretty sure his stomach wouldn’t like it. It’s not fond of free-fall or carnival rides. However, two hours of reduced gravity doesn’t upset his digestion, and gives them ample opportunity to investigate the possibilities of configurations that could never be managed otherwise. It probably would have been even better in less cramped quarters – Jared keeps banging his knee against the ceiling, and at one point Jensen throws his head back and bashes it on the seat of the chair – but they both agree it was awesome despite the injuries.

They’re not the only ones who pair off during the voyage. Kip and Hiroko haven’t let go of each other since the first night. Katie Cassidy seems to be working her way methodically through the roster of eligible men, trying them out in turn, while Matt and Emma spend a few days as a couple before inviting Kenji to join them as well.

Jensen supposes that a high level of casual sex makes sense. They’re all young, healthy, genetically perfect individuals with normal sex drives and not much else to do. They’ll be spending their lives together, having children with each other: they might as well get to know each other as well as possible, and pick the perfect mate. No hard feelings.

What he feels for Jared already, though, is anything but casual. He thinks, hopes, that Jared might feel the same, but he can’t tell. There’s something in Jared’s eyes sometimes: something a little guarded.

They’ve got time. All the time in the world. Their new world.

 

  


 

They’re strapped in a final time for landing. Actually, for splashdown. The ship lands in a giant lake, the size of an inland sea, and navigates to the site chosen for the first human settlement on Mirna – the first extraterrestrial human settlement ever.

The unmanned probe that had identified Mirna as being a suitable target for human colonization had provided them with enough data to generate a map complete with land masses, topography, locations of large mineral deposits, and a rough idea of how thick the vegetation was. Mirna has fairly Earth-like conditions, with a yellow sun, nitrogen/oxygen environment, and some basic plant life. The amino acid balance that developed here isn’t cross-compatible with Earth’s, so they do have to grow their own food rather than relying on local vegetation – but they probably would have done that anyway, with toxicity testing coming later – and on the plus side, it means there isn’t going to be cross-pollination.

Jared’s pretty keen to get out and inspect the local flora. They aren’t actually sure how the Mirna plants reproduce, whether they even use pollen – there don’t seem to be any insects on the planet, so the colony has brought nanobot pollinators with them – and he’d like to be sure that there aren’t going to be any issues of cross-mating or interactions with their own crops. He needs to work out the amino acids available to his plants in the soil, and how best to make up the balance with fertilizer, human and food waste.

Everyone’s solemn and silent again as they exit the ship, setting foot on their new world for the first time. Some of them kneel down and put both palms against the ground; some have tears in their eyes.

Jared kneels, bends his head, and sniffs the dirt. It smells good, clean. Welcoming.

On that first day, they clear ground, mark out the fields and food plots, spaces for the residence buildings and labs, and start setting up the pre-fabricated buildings. That night and the night after, they sleep in the ship, but the following day they get the main residence set up – cafeteria, bathrooms, and all – and move in.

There’s a big party that night. Sean sets up an informal bar in the corner of the lounge. People dance, make out, drink, dance some more, and stagger off to their new rooms in the early hours of the morning.

It already feels like home.

Jared finds it remarkable how fast the rest of the settlement gets established. It’s fascinating to watch. Everything’s made to be modular, unfolding like a paper flower in water – or, Jared thinks, more like an embryo expanding bit by bit under a series of preprogrammed instructions. Or like yeast budding. Like the colony is a little bud of humanity that’s following the innate drive of DNA to self-replicate and spread.

He doesn’t have time for much philosophical musing. The food supplies they have with them are calculated with a substantial safety margin, but it’s vital to get food production underway as soon as possible. Three years worth of weather data from the discovery probe has allowed them to get a sense of the climate and time their arrival for the “spring”, so he can get crops in the ground. After the first few days of set-up, he’s relieved of his construction duties and instead turns his attention to soil preparation, careful fencing to minimize contamination with outside flora, and planting.

Once the seeds are in the ground, the demands of his position slack off a bit. He and Cassidy take a tour each morning to observe and record growth, but as there don’t seem to be any problems so far, there’s not much else he has to do. They can’t afford to have people in just one job, though; everyone gets redeployed to somewhere else they can be useful, and Jared finds himself tasked with assembling water pipelines and setting up solar panels. He’ll have time in the lab eventually, but for now he enjoys the work that keeps him outside: the weather’s good, and the skies over the lake are everchangingly beautiful.

There’s a party almost every week, on the night before the rest day, but most evenings people gather in the lounge. Sean’s kept his bar going, and has found time away from his official jobs to construct a small still – he’s already put an order in with Jared for extra grain, if the crops do well – and start up a couple of batches of beer.

Sean’s a microbiologist, in charge of their composting and waste recycling facilities. He’s also the emergency back-up plan for food: if Jared’s agricultural undertakings fail or don’t provide enough nutrition for the colony, Sean will be in charge of growing large vats of microorganisms to produce valuable, albeit tasteless and mushy, protein. He knows his yeast: if anyone in this colony is likely to produce good beer, it’s Sean.

Jared enjoys hanging out in the lounge at first, but after a couple of weeks, he finds the conversations… awkward. The discussions in the lounge are exuberant and wide-ranging. Everyone talks a lot about the future, their future. And it becomes clear that Jensen wasn’t the only one on the ship who was glad to escape Earth and its unmodified, inferior humans.

He can’t react. It’s done now, he’s here. Plus, he passed the tests, didn’t he? He’s as good as them.

He’s with Jensen. And it’s perfect.

 

  


 

The weather stays fantastic for weeks: gentle rain during the night, sunshine all day, nice light breeze. It’s a surprise, therefore, when Jared’s working out in his farthest field and gets a radio call to come back immediately.

“Storm coming,” Mar says. “It looks like a big one. It’s probably still a few hours away, but until we know the weather patterns better, I think we should play it safe.”

On his walk back, Jared can sense the barometric pressure shifting. The wind picks up, swirling dust around the compound and whipping up waves on the lake.

It’s a dry storm, at first. The lightning is unbelievable, sheeting across the broad flat sky, and the thunder echoes off the lake. They stay indoors, clustered around the windows and watching the display of brilliance. The rain doesn’t come until an hour later, after the electrical display has moved off inland, but when it comes it comes hard, drumming on the roofs and bouncing off the ground. Jared’s a little worried for his seedlings, but there’s not much he can do for them at this point. They’re should be okay, they’re tough.

As it turns out, the torrential rain only lasts about half an hour, and then settles down to a gentle drizzle.

“That,” Jensen says in his ear, “was very exciting.”

“Oh yeah?” Jared says.

“Yeah,” Jensen murmurs. “Wanna go for a walk?”

“In the rain?” Jared says.

“Uh huh.” Jensen’s hand slides into the back of his waistband. “Let’s go experience nature.”

They’re soaked within seconds of stepping outside, but it’s a warm rain. They walk down to the lake, pausing every so often to kiss. At the shore, they stand, hands entwined, looking out over the endless dark water. There’s still faint light in the sky, crackles of lightning in the distance.

“Glad you came?” Jensen says.

“I haven’t come yet,” Jared answers, and kisses Jensen again.

They’re both hard and eager, but their wet clothes slow things down. Jensen gets a hand between Jared’s legs, rubbing him through his jeans. Jared groans and moves his grip down to Jensen’s ass, pulling their bodies closer together. Jensen shifts, spreading his knees and bringing his crotch against Jared’s thigh, settling into a rocking rhythm in time with his hand on Jared.

“Get these off,” Jensen murmurs, although he makes no move to undo Jared’s jeans, seemingly unwilling to let go of Jared’s cock for even a second. “Fuck me.”

Jared lets out a shuddering breath and moves his hands to his fly, batting Jensen’s hand away and tearing open the buttons. His dick springs out, the thin wet cotton of his boxer shorts insufficient to restrain it. Jensen makes an appreciative ‘mmm’ and grips the hem of his t-shirt, peeling it up over his head. Jared watches, mesmerized, as the planes of Jensen’s chest emerge, silvered and shadowed in the night.

Jensen’s already out of his clothes, and Jared realizes he’s just been standing there, staring. He yanks his own shirt over his head, and Jensen peels his wet jeans down his thighs, pausing to mouth the head of his cock and then suddenly suck hard, in a move that makes Jared’s knees buckle.

They fuck there on the shore of the lake, Jensen riding Jared slowly, head arched back and mouth open to the rain. Jared feels wild and primitive, part of nature – here, on an alien planet that shares none of his nature, he feels at one with the universe. He grips Jensen’s hips and fucks harder and harder, tangles a hand in Jensen’s short hair and pulls his head back, biting at his neck and shoulder.

He comes inside Jensen with a hoarse shout, rocking into him, feeling Jensen reach his own climax.

“That was…” Jensen says finally.

“Yeah.”

“We’re not gonna be able to get our clothes back on, are we?”

They don’t even bother to try.

“Thank you,” Jensen murmurs as they curl into bed after a shared hot shower.

“For what?”

“For saying yes. For being you.”

Jared buries his nose in Jensen’s hair. “I couldn’t be anybody else.”

“You know what I mean.”

 

  


 

Jensen’s moving stiffly the next morning. Jared doesn’t think he was that rough on him but he does feel a bit guilty.

They spend the day doing fairly heavy work outside. That evening Jensen begs off playing basketball because his knees hurt.

“We can stay in,” Jared offers.

“Nah, man,” Jensen says, leering at him. “I’ll just watch you get all hot and sweaty.”

Jensen’s slower than usual on the walk to the recreation area – at the moment, just a large patch of cleared, flattened dirt where they’ve set up a couple of hoops and posts for a volleyball net, although they’ve got plans for a more permanent construction later – and Jared tries not to make it too obvious that he’s watching him.

He keeps an eye on him during the game, too. At one point, when Jared’s team scores, Jensen cheers and punches the air. It’s obvious that the movement hurts him; he grits his teeth, then quickly tries to smooth his face into a relaxed expression and gives a thumbs up as he sees Jared looking towards him.

When they get back to sleeping quarters, Jensen joins Jared, but isn’t up for anything physical. He winces as he pulls his jeans off.

“What’s wrong?” Jared says. Enough is enough.

“Nothing.”

“Cut the bullshit, man.”

“I dunno. Think I overdid it on the digging. Everything hurts.”

“We should go to the med unit,” Jared says immediately. “Get you checked out. Maybe you’re coming down with something.”

“I just need some rest.” Jensen tugs his shirt off, grimacing as he lowers his arms. “Don’t freak out.”

“We’re on an _alien planet_ ,” Jared points out, as calmly as he can. “I think we ought to be careful.”

“I’m not running to the doctor because I worked too hard.”

“You don’t know that’s what it is.” Jared runs his eyes over Jensen’s exposed skin, looking for rashes, bruises, anything unusual. “They should do some tests.”

Jensen scowls. “Drop it, Jared.”

Jared takes a deep breath, lets it out again slowly, and tries to keep the worry out of his voice. “Okay, maybe I’m over-reacting. I just think you should get it checked out. They’ll probably say you’re fine, and you can make fun of me all you want for being a mother hen, but it’s better than pretending like nothing’s wrong and suddenly your arms fall off.”

“My arms aren’t going to fall off,” Jensen growls, but there’s a smile tugging at his lips. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Please?” Jared says. It comes out sounding needier than he meant it to. He bites his lip. “For me.”

Jensen flops on the bed and worms his way under the duvet.

“For you. In the morning. If I still feel shitty after a good night’s sleep, I’ll go see them in the morning. Okay?”

Jared shakes his head, but he’ll take what he can get.

“I’ll drag you there myself.”

“Sounds fun,” Jensen mumbles into the pillow.

Jared strips and crawls in next to him. Jensen doesn’t feel unusually hot.

“I can hear you worrying,” Jensen mutters. “Stop it. I’ll be fine in the morning.”

 

  


 

Jensen is not fine in the morning. He looks like hell. His face is taut with pain.

“That’s it.” Jared throws a clean shirt and boxers at Jensen. “Get these on. We’re going to the infirmary.”

He gets even more worried when Jensen doesn’t argue, just starts getting dressed, visibly struggling with every movement.

The corridors are weirdly silent. They don’t encounter anyone.

They pass the mess hall on their way. By this time, Jensen is stumbling, leaning against Jared as he walks and failing to suppress tiny whimpers of pain. His face is almost grey and there are beads of sweat at his temples.

“Stop a moment,” he mutters.

Jared stops immediately, and slides an arm around Jensen’s waist. He does his best not to jostle him, biting his lip at the agonized expression that crosses Jensen’s face.

“Shit,” Jensen says, looking into the mess.

There are only a few people in there. They don’t look as bad as Jensen, but they’re quiet and moving slowly. Jared barely recognizes the woman heading back to her table with a bowl of oatmeal: the long blonde braid and height are Katie’s, but the walk is entirely different, stiff and cautious. He watches Katie lower herself into her chair slowly, flinching as her knees bend. Her face is drawn and pale.

Jared is seriously freaking out at this point.

“So it’s not just me.” Jensen grits his teeth. “Let’s go.”

They only make it another twenty feet before Jensen has a seizure.

It’s one of the scariest things Jared has ever witnessed. He gets a second’s warning, Jensen’s grip on his arm loosening, before Jensen’s eyes roll back and his whole body starts convulsing.

Jared lowers him to the ground and sits with him, cushioning Jensen’s head against his own body, and watches him helplessly. He thinks back to their first aid training, remembers reading that you shouldn’t put anything in someone’s mouth, but beyond that his mind’s a blank. How long is too long? Can he move him when he’s like this?

“It’s okay, it’ll be okay,” he finds himself murmuring over and over, and knows the mantra’s more for himself than the unhearing Jensen.

It probably isn’t more than a minute and a half, but it feels like an eternity before Jensen’s movements slow and finally stop.

“Jensen?” he says softly. “I’m gonna carry you, okay? We have to get you to the infirmary. They’ll help you there.”

Jensen’s eyelids don’t even flicker. Jared clenches his jaw, scoops him up, and takes off as fast as he can.

Jensen remains unconscious nearly all the way there, which makes Jared nearly mindless with worry, but on the plus side, it’s at least a short period during which Jensen doesn’t appear to be suffering. The moment he wakes up, he’s moaning again.

The infirmary has a double airlock entry system, to allow for quarantine. Jared knows this because he helped assemble it, which involved a lot of heavy panels. He’s surprised to see that it’s not being used; both doors stand wide open.

He hauls Jensen across the threshold and sucks in a shocked breath. The outer area, designed to be used for minor procedures, benchwork and various tests, is in disarray; the lab counter is covered in tubes, reagents and bits of equipment.

Through another door, he can see into the inner room, designed as a sickbay. It was made to hold ten beds, with provision for another twenty cots that could be deployed if needed. There are probably seventy or eighty unmoving bodies in there, some doubled up on the beds and cots, some laid out on blankets covering the floor.

“Oh, my god,” he blurts out.

“Jared!”

The head medic Tamara appears from behind the inner door. “Are you – you don’t look too bad? Is that Jensen? Bring him in, I’ll give him something.”

“What’s going on?” He tries not to raise his voice, conscious of Jensen’s head on his shoulder, but panic and anger make it harsh. “What’s wrong with them? Why isn’t the place on lockdown?”

“They’re sedated.” She crosses the room to them and takes Jensen’s wrist, fingers seeking the pulse. “Most of them dragged themselves here. They were in pain, but still conscious. Then Matt brought in a few who were having convulsions, and immediately had one himself. I sedated them right off, but I thought I’d better give the others some too to prevent it.” She lets go of Jensen’s wrist and switches her attention to his face, lifting his eyelids and making a humming noise.

“What?” Jared says quickly.

“He had a seizure?” It’s not really a question. “Put him over there, on that blanket, and I’ll get him something.”

Jared hastens to lay Jensen down carefully. “What _is_ it?”

“No idea yet. I started running tests the minute Kenji came in – he was the first – but that was only a couple of hours ago. I haven’t found anything yet. As to quarantine, I don’t see the point, really. Everyone on the planet appears to be affected.”

“You?” Jared looks more closely at her. “Are you…?”

“Not too bad yet.” She kneels down beside Jensen, and now that Jared looks more closely, she’s moving more slowly and stiffly than usual. “Mild symptoms only. Probably because I’ve hardly been outside.”

The med unit hasn’t – until today – been in high demand. Everyone had agreed, though, that it was a good idea to have someone there at all times in case of emergency. As a result, Tamara’s been based indoors for nearly all her shifts. She’s been multi-tasking, just like the rest of them, but it was all computer-based work: scheduling, preparing reports, monitoring the weather systems.

“Outside?” Jared’s spent practically his entire six weeks on the planet outside.

“I think so.” Tamara tilts her head toward the inner room. “People who seem to be the worst or the earliest affected, like Kenji or Saira, had mostly outside jobs. Or spent a lot of their free time outdoors – I know Mar went out every chance she got. I’ve gone for the occasional walk, played softball once, but I really don’t get out much.”

She gives a wry smile. “I kept thinking I’d do that after I got everything sorted out in here. You know, when I was sitting around with nothing to do.”

“I was outside a lot, and I’m not affected,” Jared says. “Uh. I mean, I don’t think I am. I feel fine.”

“Huh.” She stares at him. “Thank god. I need to do more tests and I keep dropping the fucking tubes, my hands shake so much.” She pulls a needle out of her pocket, taps it against her other hand and holds it up to the light to check for bubbles, and Jared can see what she means about the shakes. “I’ll get this into him and then we’ll do them together. I’ll tell you what to do, you can run them for me. I know you’re a plant guy, but it’s mostly the same techniques.”

“Uh,” Jared says, watching her bring the needle towards Jensen in wavering arcs. “Are you sure you can…”

“I’m not _that_ bad yet. It’s just an IM shot.”

“I don’t know what that means.”

“Intramuscular.” She stabs the needle into Jensen’s leg, depresses the plunger. “You don’t have to hit a small target. I could do this blind and one-handed.” She snorts. “Let’s hope that’s not what comes next.”

She pulls the empty syringe free and flips the safety cover shut. “Okay. Help me up. We’ll start with the blood samples.”

Over the next few hours, Jared runs every test Tamara can think of. Most of the machines are automated; once he’s loaded the samples and prepared the next batch, he has some free time while they cycle. He uses that to run a bunch of colonists through the scanner, Jensen among them. It confirms that Jensen has a brain, but beyond that he has no idea what he’s looking at.

“That’s the twelfth complete body scan,” he says, after positioning Emma back on her mat. “Anything yet?”

Tamara’s crawling from person to person along the floor, checking vitals, as she’s done every hour since he arrived. He holds out his hand and helps her, carefully, to her feet. She walks slowly to the chair at the scanner control desk and sits, tipping her head back against the cushion and staring at the screens in front of her.

“Here,” she says, removing a couple of syringes from her lab coat pocket and placing them on the desk. They start to roll towards the edge; Jared retrieves them and puts his sunglasses beside them to stop them going anywhere. “The unlabelled one is a sedative; the one with a red band is epinephrine. If I start seizing, give me the plain one. If my heart stops, try the other. It probably won’t work, but it’s worth a shot.”

Jared stares at her, shocked. “Your heart?”

“Could happen.” Tamara shrugs, eyes on the screen as she pulls up scan results. “Prepare for the worst, that’s what my dad always said. I’m not so bad now, but I’m still working. The ones in there seem to be stable, but they’re sedated: that keeps down the metabolic demand. Odds are, I’m going to get worse in the next few hours.”

“How do I give it?” Jared eyes the syringes.

“Like I did. Into the muscle.”

“Just… shove it in?”

She snickers. “That’s right. Okay, let’s see what we’ve got.”

What they’ve got, it appears, as she scrolls through scan after scan and makes increasingly frustrated noises, is nothing.

“There isn’t any tissue damage.” Tamara starts to raise her arm to point at the scans, then gives up. “The joints, the muscles…nothing looks structurally wrong.”

“What about infection? Or some kind of allergy?”

“There’s no swelling. No fluid collections, no sign of inflammation.” Tamara shakes her head. “Plus, we don’t have everyone’s blood results back yet, but the ones we do have look normal, and they’re from the worst affected. I organized the samples you ran in batches of ten; Saira, Kenji and Mar are all in the first lot.”

“Is _anything_ coming back abnormal?” Jared leans in to look more closely at the scans, though what the hell he’s looking for, he has no idea. Plant cellular structure, sequencing gels or Western blots, he can do; body scans, not so much.

“Not really. A couple of people are a bit dehydrated. Nathan had a scratch on his arm, but it’s healing well… I suppose something could have gotten into his bloodstream, but that doesn’t explain everyone else.”

She chews her lip, eyes losing focus as she stares into the distance.

“It _hurts_.”

Jared frowns, turning to her. “Can I get you something? Water? Aspirin?”

“No, I don’t mean – it does hurt, now, but that’s not what I meant. That’s how it starts, that’s what everyone said. _Everything_ hurts. All over. It’s like… it’s like maybe pain itself is the problem.”

“But something has to be causing the pain. Right?”

“Yeah…” Tamara draws the word out. “But maybe it’s not something external affecting the pain system. Maybe it’s a problem in the system itself. The type of pain – it’s diffuse. Slow. It’s not like a cut, or a broken leg… Maybe it’s something wrong with the nervous system? Sensing pain where there shouldn’t be any?”

“Didn’t you already look at the nervous system?” Jared asks. “People are having seizures. You checked that, right?”

“Of course! We’ve done the brain scans. And I managed to do a spinal tap on two of the first ones to arrive. After that, my motor control was getting sloppy enough that I didn’t want to risk it, but the results were normal. No protein, no inflammatory cells, no sign of infection.”

“Not infection, okay.” Jared stands up and starts pacing. “So. What else could it be?”

“I don’t _know,_ ” Tamara says, voice rising. “I’ve tested for everything I can think of, and it’s all coming back negative.”

“Then think of something else!” Jared snaps. “You’re the doctor! I can help, I can run the machines and whatever else you need, but I do plants! They don’t _have_ nervous systems!”

He breaks off and looks helplessly at her. She’s shaking again.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m really worried and I don’t know how to fix this. You’re getting worse, and _he’s_ getting worse, and we’re coming up with nothing.”

_If we don’t fix this, Jensen will die. All of you will die, and I’ll be left alone on a planet of the dead._

“You can run the machines,” Tamara says. She sounds dazed; Jared hopes she isn’t about to start having seizures.

“Yes,” he says, “I’ve been doing it, remember? I can run the tests for you. Just tell me what to do.”

She rolls her eyes at him. “I’m not losing my mind. I know you’ve been running them. That’s the point. Okay, maybe I _am_ losing my mind to this shit, because I should have thought of this ages ago, but the point is, you’re fine. You’ve been doing the hands-on stuff because _you,_ Jared, aren’t affected by whatever this is.”

“Yeah?”

“So, why the hell not?” She pushes herself up on the arms of her chair and leans towards him, narrowing her eyes as if she can somehow see the nerves running beneath his skin. “What is different about you?”

Jared gapes.

Yeah, okay, maybe Jensen was right about non-mods being fundamentally dumb because the answer is so blindingly obvious.

In his defense, he’s spent the last week working hard, staying up late being fucked stupid, and for the last twenty-four hours he’s been out of his mind with worry about Jensen. But still. He owes himself a good kick in the head.

“Uh,” he says articulately.

Tamara makes a _what gives?_ gesture with her hands.

“I’m – ” Jared takes a deep breath. Secrecy is irrelevant at this point, and besides, he’d sacrifice anything, give up and go home, go to jail, anything, if it would fix Jensen. It’s still hard to say. “I’m not a mod. Or at least… I don’t think I am.”

It’s Tamara’s turn to stare goggle-eyed at him. _“What?”_

“Yeah.” Jared shrugs. “I guess that’s kind of important.”

“You don’t _think?_ ” Tamara sounds incredulous. “What do you mean? How can you – how can you not know?!”

“I wasn’t born a mod.” In for a penny, in for a pound. “I faked the screening test to get accepted. Only then…they did the full genome sequencing, right? I didn’t know about that, and I didn’t fake it. But I passed.”

She stares at him. “You _can’t_ have.”

“I know! I don’t understand either. And believe me, I’ve thought about it a _lot._ I, uh, during the screening test fake, I ended up swallowing some modified DNA that I’d made with PCR. I wondered if something I’d done had accidentally changed it? Like, maybe I found the secret to adult modification and I didn’t even know it.”

“That can’t be it,” she says. “The DNA would have broken down in your stomach acid.”

“I know.” Jared shrugs. “I told you, I have no idea. But somehow I made it through the sequencing and it told them I’m a mod.”

“There’s no way it worked on you as an adult,” Tamara says. “It can’t. The way it works… it just can’t. Somebody made a mistake. You aren’t a mod, Jared. And you’re not affected by whatever this is.”

“So it’s something to do with the mod,” Jared says, twiddling a pencil between his fingers. “

“Yes, and we know which genes the mod targets!” Tamara reaches for her tablet and fumbles with the stylus. Jared watches as she pulls up a government article that explains the benefits of the mod to potential parents. “We can cross-check ours against yours! I can’t remember them all off the top of my head, but the reference should be in here somewhere…hang on…”

Her expression has lit up and she’s jittering, practically vibrating out of her chair. Jared thinks about what she’d said about metabolic rate accelerating the process. “Um,” he says. “Maybe, uh, maybe you should calm down? Take some deep breaths?”

She ignores him and clicks through a couple of links. “Aha! Here we go. Zhen’s follow-up paper. Table Four. It’s a list of all the major genes he targeted.” She frowns. “Some of the different clinics tweaked theirs slightly, and I know it varies a little country to country, but these are the big ones. I suggest we start with them.”

“We can probably narrow it down,” Jared says. “Figure out which are the most likely candidate genes, and I’ll check them first. You’ve got everyone’s genomic sequences, right? We can compare them all, see where mine stands out.”

“Except we don’t have yours.” Tamara eases herself back against the chair, face drawn. “Whatever I’ve got on file for you, I don’t believe it. Start sequencing, Jared.”

Jared nods. “On it.”

“I’ll have a look at the list, see what….”

There’s a crunch as her tablet hits the floor. The stylus flies out of her flailing hand. Her eyes jerk repeatedly to the side and she’s almost flung out of the chair by the force of the seizure that racks her whole body.

Jared lunges forward and catches her before she can hit the ground or knock her head against the counter. He lays her on the floor, keeping his arm under her head to prevent it from slamming against the tile, and looks around for something soft. His jacket’s the only thing within reach; he snags it with his other arm and pulls it under her, cushioning her head.

He retrieves the plain syringe from the table and comes back to her side. Pushing up her sleeve, he holds her arm as still as possible, and injects the contents into her muscle.

It’s the first time he’s stuck a needle into a human being. It’s a little weird.

She continues jerking for several seconds, but then gradually the muscle spasms slow and eventually stop. Her eyelids fall shut, but she’s breathing, deep and evenly.

He looks at her lax body, then over at Jensen’s. Beyond Jensen, he can see the others in the far room: friends, co-workers, fellow pioneers.

He’s on his own.

 

[Part Four](http://electricalgwen.livejournal.com/105878.html)


	4. SPN J2 AU Fic: Inclusions (4/4)

  


 

He retrieves Tamara’s tablet. The screen cracked in its fall, but it’s still legible, and still displaying the article she was reading. _Thank god._

He scans through the introduction. It’s a follow-up paper from the institution that introduced the mod itself, evaluating twenty years of their work and describing some updates and improvements.

Table Four, she’d said.

He looks at the list of target genes. A few of them sound familiar – he recognizes the tumor suppressor genes, and one that’s probably related to oxygen-carrying capacity – but at least half are things he’s never heard of.

Damn it, he’s going to have to read the actual paper.

Once he gets going, it’s actually not that bad. It may not be plants, but it’s still genetics. He lingers on a few of the technical details, skips over the section about ethics review and patent battles, and reads carefully through the discussion, searching for any mention of why genes were chosen. Anything that might have to do with the nervous system.

There are several paragraphs on optimizing immunity, and a number of genes are mentioned in the text. He can’t be sure this isn’t some weird auto-immune malfunction, but if Tamara’s right about it being a problem with the nervous system, those genes are maybe less likely. He mentally moves them to the bottom of the list.

He finishes that section and moves on to the next, which discusses maximizing cardiovascular fitness and reducing atherosclerotic disease, but something about the last few sentences he read keeps nagging at him. He backtracks and reads them again. _Following the characterization of c-tyr by Pollock et al. as an important inducible factor in natural killer cell responses, this was added to the new allelic modification._

His eyes widen as he realizes what his brain was trying to tell him. Jensen’s affected, and Jensen had to have been among the first wave of modified kids, so he can ignore any of the later adjustments.. He quickly backtracks through the paper, finding the original list of modifications and cross-checking it with the later version: that eliminates thirty from his list of candidates.

There are still a lot on the list, though. Too many for him to sequence and check them all against his own DNA, especially if he has to formulate selective primers for each one.

“Help me,” he mutters – to himself, to the unconscious Tamara, to any god who cared to listen – and reads on.

The section on intelligence is long, and full of convoluted technical language as well as some possibly dodgy social science, but what comes through clearly is that the mod was designed to improve three major things in the nervous system: connectivity, repair potential, and the speed of neurotransmission.

Connectivity’s probably out. That would have been most important during brain development, not such a big deal in adults. Repair potential, maybe? That might be related to pain perception.

He keeps reading. Distant memories of undergrad physiology well up in his mind. Neurotransmitters. Receptors. Myelination. Neurite outgrowth. Speed of the action potential.

_Standardization of the GABA-B metabotropic receptor appears to have had the desired effect of balancing neural inhibition and improving interhemispheric cooperation, together with the beneficial side effect of increasing mood stability. Seizure threshold is also improved._

He sits bolt upright and reads that sentence again, pulse picking up. Seizures.

_The structural complexity of the GABA-B receptor renders it susceptible to disruption in various ways. Multiple splice variants of the B1 subunit exist, with several allelic versions of each. We chose the [leu] version of GABA-B1a, as demonstrating the most stability and reduced potential for disruption by translational errors…_

“GABA,” he says aloud.

He spins the chair around and places Tamara’s tablet carefully on the table, then uses her desktop computer controls to pull up some basic information on mammalian neurobiology, stuff he hasn’t had to think about in over a decade.

He learns – relearns – that GABA is a neurotransmitter, one of the chemicals involved in communication between cells in the central nervous system. It works by binding to receptors, which when activated affect the function of the cell, and inhibits electrical activity. Disruption of GABA function can lead to seizures, through over-excitation in the brain, and can also produce muscle spasticity. In the spinal cord, GABA modulates signal transmission in the dorsal horn, which –

“Is important in both fast and slow pain pathways!” he says triumphantly, shoving his chair back and standing. _That has to be it._ According to the paper, the mods all have the same GABA receptor, chosen to give their brains and nerves stability and speed. If something – something new, something on an alien planet – were to interfere with it… Seizures. Pain. It fits.

He pushes a hand through his hair and considers. To prove it, he’d need to sequence his own GABA receptor and compare it to that of the mods. He wouldn’t have to sequence the mod version, it’ll be in their genomes on record – but he does need to know where to look, which means going back to reading, to find out where to locate it. Not to mention, figuring out which primers to use to sequence his own.

But even if he’s right – so what? What’s he going to do about it? He can’t _un_ -modify them. It doesn’t work that way.

“Fuck!” he yells, and kicks his chair. It promptly falls over, wheels spinning uselessly.

There’s a moan from behind him. He whirls round. Tamara’s opening her eyes.

“Tam!” He rushes over and kneels beside her. “Are you okay?”

“I feel like shit.” Her voice is gravelly. “What happened?”

“You had a seizure.” He takes her wrist, feels for the pulse. Like he knows what the hell he’s doing. “I gave you the sedative. How come you’re awake? None of the others are.”

“I put a pretty low dose in that syringe.” She licks her lips. “Yuck. Did I bite my tongue? My mouth tastes awful. Anyway, I hoped it would be enough to stop the seizure, but I didn’t want to be out for too long. I’m no use unconscious.”

“You’re no use dead either,” Jared says. “Take more if you need more.”

“I don’t have more,” she admits. “I was the last, you know? I didn’t know about you. That you’d be okay. So I thought, I’d give it to the others. No point saving it for me because if I went down, who was going to give it to me? I kept the last little bit, in case I had some warning of the seizure – thought it might get me through the first one. But I figured that if I hadn’t found a solution by the time I was that bad, we didn’t have a chance anyway.”

Jared can’t think of anything to say.

“The paper,” she says. “I need to read the paper. Can you hold the screen for me?”

“Yeah, but let me run something by you first,” Jared says. “I read it while you were out, the list of genes and stuff, and I was wondering… I’m not a medic, of course, but I was wondering if it might be related to GABA receptors.”

“Huh.” Tamara pokes her tongue between her teeth and ponders that for a few seconds. Her left arm spasms.

“Shit,” says Jared.

“Vodka.”

Jared blinks. “What?”

“Get me a drink. Straight vodka best. _Ow._ ”

“Are you sure? You just had a seizure.”

“That’s the point. It’ll prevent more.” She glares at his dubious expression. “Trust me. I’m a doctor.”

Her left hand starts twitching.

“Alcohol is a depressant. It does similar things to GABA. If you’re right, then it’ll help fix me up while we figure out what to do.” Her arm spasms again and she grits her teeth, wincing with pain. “Jesus, what does a girl have to do to get a drink around here? Go!”

Jared goes, racing to the lounge, to Sean’s makeshift bar. He grabs a half-full bottle of vodka – and one each of rum and Scotch, for good measure – and runs back to sickbay, praying Tamara hasn’t passed out again in the meantime.

Her left arm and shoulder are jerking rhythmically but she’s still awake. He lifts her upper body, cradling her against his chest, and tips the bottle to her mouth. She takes a large swallow, coughs, takes a few more.

“That’s probably enough,” she croaks. Her eyes are watering. Jared reaches up and places the bottle on the desk, then lays her carefully back down, watching her intently.

Her left arm movements slow, then stop completely.

She sits up. Jared reaches to support her, but she waves him away. He watches as she grips the desk and hauls herself to her feet, then lets go and takes a few steps. She’s a bit wobbly, but she’s moving more fluidly, and the twitching has all gone.

“Good?” he says, hovering in case she falls.

“Not sure.” She rolls her head around in a slow circle. “Still hurts. Better have some more.”

Jared passes her the bottle. She squints at the level, and drinks another couple of inches.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Jared says, worried. Tamara’s tall, but slender, and that’s a lot of hard liquor for anyone.

“Yeah, I’m good.” She hands the bottle back, then tips her head back, raises both arms above her head and gives a long stretch. “ _That’s_ better. I can move again!”

“How long is it going to last?” He frowns. “And how’s it working? Can we fix the others? What do I do?”

“Whoa.” She raises a hand to slow the flood of questions. “Tell me what you figured out, again. It’s hard to concentrate when you feel like you’re in the Iron Maiden, I don’t think I got it all. Plus, forgive me if I ask stupid questions. I think I may be a leetle bit drunk.”

“Uh-huh,” Jared says, and walks her through it all again: the paper, the list of genes in the original mod, the involvement of GABA in seizures and pain.

“Yeah,” she says, nodding faster and faster as he reaches the end, “yeah. It fits. And I think we just proved it, empirically. The alcohol’s working to counteract things.”

“How?”

She shrugs, then looks delighted. “Hey, that doesn’t hurt! Look!” She turns her head from side to side like the proverbial cat at a tennis match, looking from one shoulder to the other as she shrugs repeatedly.

Jared suppresses both his irritation and his urge to laugh. “Uh, Tamara? We need to focus. How does the alcohol help?”

“Hmm? Oh.” She furrows her brow. “I don’t know.”

“How – ” he breaks off, takes a breath. “How can you not know? You figured out that it would work.”

“Well, it could be a couple of different things, right?”

“You’ll have to explain it to me,” he says. “I do plants, remember?”

“Oh, yeah. Well, it could be activating the GABA pathways. That’s if whatever’s screwing us up is reversible. Or it might just be substituting for them, damping down all the other stuff in the brain that normally gets inhibited by GABA.”

“Can we figure out which one of those it is?” Jared thinks. “Hang on, do we need to figure it out? Or can we fix it anyway?”

“Oh, we’d need to know,” Tamara says. “But I’m not sure we can fix it, whatever the answer is.”

“What?” Jared says, panicked. “You said we’d figure out what to do!”

“I am figuring.” She glares at him. “And what I figure is, our GABA systems have quit working. You think that’s ‘cos of a receptor problem, and you’re probably right – we can check it pretty easily, though, just haul one of those guys in and I’ll check their neurotransmitter levels – which means. Um. Where was I?”

“It’s a receptor problem.”

“Right. So – wait, do you know how drugs work?”

“Which ones?”

“Most of them!”

“Kind of?”

“They bind to receptors! They alter the function of receptors. Turn them on, or off. So, I’m _figuring_ that something we’ve been exposed to is binding our GABA receptors, and blocking them. So they don’t work.”

“But mine do.”

“Yeah. Because you aren’t modified. Receptors are large proteins, right, with all these different bits? There can be a whole lot of differences that don’t really matter, as long as they don’t affect the functional part. Like how it doesn’t matter what color your eyes are, all the different colors can see fine, right?

You’ve got a receptor that’s just a little bit different. It wouldn’t matter on Earth, but it means that whatever’s affecting us here can’t stick to you. Or if it does, it doesn’t stop it from working.”

Jared thinks. “Can we get it out of your systems? Is there any way to knock it off the receptors?”

“Maybe. Could be reversible, or irreverer… irreversible,” Tamara over-enunciates. “If it’s irreva – if it won’t come off, the only way to fix it is to wait for new receptors to be made.”

“How long does that take?”

She makes a face and wags her head side to side. “Prob’ly a week? Maybe two.”

“But…” Jared frowns. “They’ll get jammed too, right?”

“Yeah,” Tamara nods. “Unless we remove the compound from the environment. Or remove ourselves from the environment.”

“What, leave?”

“Bingo.”

“Wait, wait.” Jared shakes his head. They can’t just go running off. “You said it might be reversible. Can’t we check that? Then maybe figure out a way to, well, reverse it?”

Tamara sighs. “Nope. Not with the equipment I got here. If it’s reversible, then _maybe_ we could find some other molecule that we could flood the body with. Some drug that would bind to the receptor in that region, displacing the toxin, but still leaving the receptor functional – and us functional, not like with alcohol. There’s no way I can do it, though. I’d need a biopsy – something that had our affected receptors in it – and it’d take some pretty fancy electrophysiology. And a bunch of test drugs I don’t have. _And_ a really long time. Then we’d have to invent a solution, and synthesize it, and test it, and probably start all over again because the odds of getting the right drug configuration the first time around? Not good. In fact, pretty fucking lousy.”

She leans against the desk and rubs her forehead. “We don’t have that kind of time. I don’t have enough drugs to keep them sedated in the meantime. Plus I’d have to start IVs or feeding tubes or something, and I don’t have enough of that either. We brought enough for a few accidents and emergencies, but we weren’t expecting _everyone_ to need this level of medical help. We’re supposed to be healthy. We’re supposed to be perfect. We’re mods.”

She drops her hand, looks at him, and he is startled to see there are tears in her eyes.

“I’ve dreamed of this forever,” she says. “Space. New worlds. New civilizations, that we build. I was so _happy_ when I was chosen. I’m sick of Earth and its bullshit. I don’t wanna go back. But I think… I think probably we are simply not compatible with this planet. I don’t think we can survive here.”

“Which means,” Jared swallows. “Going home.”

Giving up. Going back.

After everything – the deception, the panic, the training, all the effort he and everyone has put in to start making Mirna a new home – it feels unbearable to give up and walk away.

_Fly away_ , his brain corrects him, and he laughs a little wildly.

“What’s so funny?” Tamara looks bewildered and cranky.

“I…” Jared doesn’t even know how to explain the mix of feelings bubbling inside him. Jensen isn’t going to die, none of them are. They’ll have to go home, and he’ll have to get them all there, and since they’re out of sedatives he’ll have to get them all drunk, so they’re going to be no help at all, and how the hell is he supposed to pull that off without somebody falling out the airlock? And at the other end, he’ll have to explain why they aren’t all dead, which ought to be a good thing, except that it means explaining to Jeffrey Dean Morgan and the United States government that he’s a liar, and possibly going to jail forever, and Jensen won’t even come visit him because Jared’s unmodified pond slime. “I’m not laughing at you, I just…”

He settles on, “I’m not a pilot.”

“Psshh.” Tamara dismisses his worries with a wave of her hand. “Tyrone’s the best pilot there is, drunk or sober. Plus, the damn thing’s almost entirely automated anyway; he was always complaining about that. We’ll be fine.”

Maybe he could put them all on the ship and let them go. He could stay here. Grow his own food. Never have to face Jeff.

Never see Jensen again. Mind you, he’d also never have to explain to Jensen that he’s one of those despicable, unmodified, regular human beings. Someone else can break the news and watch Jensen freak out about pond slime cooties.

Yeah, like this bunch is going to be able to get themselves home by themselves.

“We better start loading them on the ship,” he says.

“What about…” Tamara’s forehead wrinkles as she thinks hard. “Everything?”

“Everything?”

“All the stuff. This place. Are we just gonna leave it?”

“Yeah,” he says.

“All by itself.” Her lips turn down. “All alone.”

“For a while.” Jared tries to inject a confidence he doesn’t feel into his voice. “For now. We’ll leave it here so we don’t have to build it all over again, okay?”

He sets his jaw, tries to make himself believe as much as her. “We’ll leave it here so that when we fix this, we can come back.”

She stares at him for a moment, and then a beaming grin spreads across her face. It’s like the sun coming up, light dancing in her eyes.

“Okay, Jared!” she says, and his name is only slightly slurred as it rolls off her tongue. “Let’s start hauling them on board, and then you can help me wake them up and sort them out. I don’t usually practice medicine while intoxicated, but I believe these are extenuating circumstances. You lemme know if you think I’m doing something really stupid, and I’ll tell you what you gotta do to get this show back on the road.”

“Okay.” Jared hesitates. “How long do we have?”

“Like I said, I’m out of sedatives. So they’re going to start waking up in the next few hours.”

“Are there any more on the ship?”

Tamara pouts out her lower lip and considers. “Hmm. Maybe a few? Might be some stuff in the first aid kits, but not enough for everyone for the trip home. Maybe to keep them all out for an extra hour or two. Most of the stuff was in my supplies here.”

Jared rubs his temples. “But they’ll start seizing again when they wake up, right? Like you did?”

“Yeah.” Tamara nods. “But then we have a party! Alcohol all round.”

“Maybe we should keep the drugs, in case someone can’t drink,” Jared suggests.

Tamara gives him a condescending look. “We’re mods. Nobody’s got enzyme deficiencies.”

“I don’t mean that,” Jared sighs. “I mean, if they’re having a seizure and we can’t safely get liquid into them.”

“Oh, yeah. Good point.” She taps a finger against pursed lips. “Yeah, we should save the sedatives for the bad cases. I’ve also got a couple of drugs that might upregulate the production of GABA receptors, which would probably help. But they’re not ones I’ve got large supplies of.”

“Keep them for emergencies,” Jared agrees. “We’ll start with Sean’s beer.”

“Thank god for Sean,” Tamara says. “Can I have another drink?”

“Already?” Jared says. “I don’t think you’d need it yet.”

“I am the doctor here, y’know.” She levels a finger at him and glares, but the effect is lessened by the way she wobbles on her feet.

“And I’m the captain,” he says. “I’ll take your medical advice under consideration. Now help me get this crew on board while they’re still easy to deal with.”

 

  


 

Jared’s memories of the flight home will surface in dreams – both good and bad – for years. He basically has to make sure everyone’s blood alcohol level doesn’t dip below a certain range, so that nobody will fry their brain any further, while keeping them sober enough that they don’t do something to endanger the ship. He’s particularly worried about Tyrone, but Tyrone reassures him he’s better at darts when he’s a couple of beers in, and he’ll have no problem hitting Earth with pinpoint precision.

Jared hopes he doesn’t mean it literally about the hitting bit, and leaves him to it. It’s not like he could do any better.

Mostly, the two weeks pass in a blur of sleep deprivation, repetitive conversations with drunk people, checking and calculating and recalculating the amount of liquor and beer left on board to make sure it’s rationed out to last until they get home, and dodging unexpected ambushes from a drunk, horny Jensen.

That last is particularly tough, given that he wants nothing less than to give up being in charge for an hour and have mind-blowing sex with a disinhibited Jensen in the supply locker. Jensen can’t understand why Jared’s avoiding him, and keeps sneaking up behind him, licking his ear and whispering things about blow jobs.

A couple of times, Jared’s resolve wavers, and he considers giving in: having one last fling with Jensen before they’re back home and Jensen learns the truth. He could tell Jensen now, he thinks. But he can’t bring himself to. He rationalizes it by deciding there’s no point in causing upset on the ship: they’re all trapped in here together. He just needs to get everyone home.

And once they’re home… Jensen’s going to hate him anyway. But maybe he’ll hate him just a little bit less if he thinks about their last voyage, and that Jared didn’t take advantage of him.

So he brushes Jensen off as gently as he can, makes excuses about the demands of his job, and jerks off alone, the bitter taste of regret heavy in his mouth.

He doesn’t sedate himself for the hyperjump this time. He’s too worried about what could happen on the other end if it wears off the others faster than it does for him. Tamara’s been helping him set and adjust the schedule for admistering beer to everyone’s various metabolisms, but he’s not sure she’s up to running it herself, especially after hyperjump sedation on top of her baseline alcohol level.

The jump is another thing that will haunt his dreams. It’s indescribable. Psychadelic. Hours later, he comes to and realizes he would have been safer with the sedation: he’s been staring out a window, stoned and apparently immobile given how stiff his limbs feel. Thankfully, when he staggers back into the infirmary, there are only a couple of people there complaining of pain, and nobody’s had a seizure. He has a drink himself, that night, and tries not to remember the feeling of being turned inside out.

He’s beyond thankful when the blue planet pops into view. They’re nearly home, and nobody’s died. Tamara doesn’t think there will even be any lasting effects. He might have been okay to let them sober up after the jump, but he’s not sure. Tamara had said a week for receptor recovery, but she was drunk at the time so he’s not sure how reliable her judgment was. He doesn’t dare, just in case. He’ll wait until they’re safely on Earth where there’s proper medical care and it’s someone else’s problem.

He figures that Mission Control can’t fail to have noticed when they came back through the hyperjump point. For the next couple of days, however, as they approach Earth, he reasons that the radio distance is still too far to allow for any type of back-and-forth conversation, so he can justify not turning it on.

The truth is, he’s dreading the conversation. He knows that he doesn’t have answers to a lot of the questions they’ll have, and the answers he does have, they aren’t going to like.

When they’re seventy-two hours out from Earth, he records a message. He turns the radio on, listens to the first several panicked squawks and inquiries that come in a few minutes later, and then simply transmits the recording. He then closes the connection.

_This is Jared Padalecki, speaking for the Mirna colonists. The whole colony had to evacuate and return due to an unforeseen medical emergency. Dr. Martin doesn’t think it’s contagious, but we should be quarantined. Please have medical teams sufficient to handle everyone, and a lot of sedatives and painkillers available._

Anything else can wait.

 

  


 

Tyrone brings the ship down with the grace and precision of a butterfly.

Jared has spent the last couple of hours explaining, in small words, that they are landing on Earth and that everyone has to stay on board until NASA says they can disembark.

The moment the ship’s engines disengage, teams of people in isolation suits surround the ship. A fleet of ambulances are parked around the perimeter of the field.

Jared and Tamara walk down the ramp together. A lone figure is waiting at the bottom. When Jared gets close enough, he recognizes Jeff Morgan behind the mask and hood.

“Dr. Martin,” he says, voice muffled. “Mr. Padalecki. What the hell is going on? Why is the radio off?”

Jared’s mouth is dry; the words he’s been rehearsing for days won’t come out.

Tamara folds her arms, lifts her chin and glares at Jeff.

“We all nearly _died_ , you fucker. Jared got us back in one piece. You be nice to him or I will cut your balls off.”

Jared gulps in surprise, and reddens as Jeff turns to him.

“Medical teams are here,” Jeff says. “That’s the priority. But the minute they’re done with you, I want the whole story. You’ll all be held in quarantine as you suggested, Mr. Padalecki, so you’ll have plenty of time to tell it. You better be more talkative than you’ve been for the past three days.”

Jared nods. He’s starting to feel light-headed. They’re home. Nobody died. He can sleep for more than three hours, for the first time in days.

“What about the others?” Jeff asks. “What’s their condition? We have stretchers.”

“They can walk,” Tamara says. “Unless you want them to do a straight line. They’re all pretty drunk. Me too, if you wanna know. I hope you brought a shitload of Valium.”

“The hell?” Jeff’s eyebrows draw down. “What happened out there?”

Jared would have answered, but he’s losing the fight against gravity. Things are starting to spin. It doesn’t seem fair; he’s the only one who _hasn’t_ been drinking.

“Jared? Jared!” Tamara’s voice echoes oddly in his ears. “Are you okay? Oh, shit, when was the last time you ate something?”

The last thing he sees is her reaching for him, as the world goes sideways.

 

  


 

After helping the hazmat-suited medics load Jared onto a stretcher, Jeff leaves them to evacuate the rest of the colonists into quarantine facilities, and heads for the emergency meeting he called when the ship broke atmosphere. Behind him, engineers, chemists, toxicologists and biologists swarm towards the ship.

“Where’s Dr. Lehmann?”

Misha had been wondering the same thing. He’s glad Dr. Ferris asked.

_This is Jared Padalecki._

The moment he’d heard that, he’d been sure he was right – and that he was going to have confess his actions, and defend his science. The recorded announcement had been classified by the military within a minute of its arrival, but either someone else in the world had been listening on the radio frequency, or someone internal had leaked it, because a few hours later it was spreading like wildfire across the internet and news media.

“He’s with the colonists,” Jeff answers. “Our medical team is taking the lead on this. Though of course we’ve got the CDC all over our backs.”

“What do we know so far?” asks the senior military guy. Misha never could keep their names and titles straight.

Jeff sighs and scratches at his chin.

“Not much about what’s causing it. The whole colony got sick at the same time. It’s something affecting the nervous system. Jared Padalecki was the only one unaffected. He helped Dr. Martin figure out that alcohol can temporarily counter the effects of whatever it is, and she made the decision to evacuate and return home.”

He pauses, and looks around at each of them.

“Dr. Martin also told me that the reason Padalecki was immune is that he claims not to be a GMP.”

_“What?!”_

Jeff nods. “We haven’t had a chance to verify that yet. Dr. Martin seems convinced, although given her blood alcohol level I’m taking that with a grain of salt. She says it’s something about the modification protocol that made them susceptible.”

Dr. Ferris whistles through her teeth.

“Yeah,” Jeff says. “The anti-mod politicians are going to have a field day once this gets out.”

“The anti-space group already are,” the woman from NASA says heavily. “They’ve been spewing crap all over the media since it got out that the ship had come back through the jump point. If we don’t spin this right, the future of the whole project is in doubt.”

“I’d think it’s in doubt anyway,” Dr. Ferris says. “Ninety-nine percent of our colonists may not survive. That’s pretty bad PR. Even if we cure them, and get the green light for a second try, we’re not likely to have volunteers lining up around the block.”

“If Padalecki’s not a GMP, how the hell did he get on that ship in the first place?” Jeff says, bewildered. “I checked his records. According to them, he passed both the screening test and the full genome sequencing. Do you think someone hacked them?”

Misha coughs. “I may have an idea about that.” He hears a quiet, shocked indrawn breath from Claire behind him.

Jeff pivots and levels a steely glare at his chief geneticist. “You do?”

“Bear in mind, he did save the life of everyone else on the mission,” Misha says, throwing a quick glance towards the door. Unfortunately, one of the military underlings is lounging against it, raising her eyebrows at him.

“I’m well aware of that,” Jeff growls. “Spill.”

“He passed the screening test. I don’t know how. When I saw his full genome sequencing, there was a… discrepancy.”

“He wasn’t a GMP, you mean,” Jeff says flatly.

“No,” Misha admits. “By then, he’d passed all the other physical, mental and psych tests. In many cases, he beat out GMPs. I thought he was a highly suitable choice for the colonizing mission. He’d acquired his excellent genetic profile naturally, and I didn’t think he should be discriminated against.”

“So you faked his report.”

Misha clenches his jaw and nods.

“Thanks for the explanation.” Jeff waves towards the door. “You’re fired. Get out.”

He’d anticipated it, but it’s still painful to hear. He nods, pushes back his chair. But he won’t leave without trying to make them understand, one more time.

“Consider what Jared Padalecki’s survival means.” He stands. “I disagreed with the decision to send only GMPs. You know my views as to the importance of genetic diversity. The Mirna mission has proved this point beyond a doubt. We can’t anticipate everything nature will throw at us, and it’s dangerous hubris to think otherwise.”

“You and your crack-pot theories,” Dr. Ferris smirks. “And it turns out you were right.  
Probably shouldn’t fire him, Jeff.”

“I can still damn well fire him! I expect employees to follow directions!” He glowers at Misha. “Jared’s just damn lucky he didn’t die on that planet too! It’s not like you predicted this and knew he’d be okay!”

“This is true,” says Misha.

“I want you out of here,” Jeff says. “Clear out your desk.”

There’s a silence. Dr. Ferris looks at Misha sympathetically. Misha stares at Jeff’s desk. He understands the man’s anger. But still.

It doesn’t matter, in the grand scheme of things. His point has been amply demonstrated.

“I understand,” he says, at the same time Claire says loudly, “No.”

He blinks at her unexpected interruption. So does everyone else.

“You owe him more than that.”

Jeff rests his chin on his folded hands and fixes her in turn with his glare. She swallows, but presses on.

“I don’t think you realize what Dr. Collins has done for you. It isn’t just that his decision saved the lives of a hundred people – ”

“Ninety-nine.”

Claire gives the military guy a disbelieving look and continues. “Okay, ninety-nine people, and avoided a complete PR disaster and possibly the abandonment of space travel for the rest of the _century!_ ”

She takes a quick breath and balls her hands into fists. “Mr. Morgan, I don’t think you have fully grasped the implications of the outcome of this mission. Settlement can go ahead, and once all the politicians have finished grand-standing and talking out their asses, it will. Mirna is fine for settlement. Just _not by mods._ ”

Misha has to admit, he hadn’t gotten to the immediate personal implications of that yet, being preoccupied by the broader picture. Judging by the awed expression of naked hope dawning on Jeff Morgan’s face, he hadn’t either. Until now.

“He’s cleared the way for non-mods to go into space. For _you_ to go,” Claire says. “I think you should be thanking him.”

 

  


 

Jared wakes up in a white room, in a white building. White on the inside, at least. There are no windows; it could be any color on the outside. Anyone from outside – medical personnel, cleaners, people who bring food – wears a white isolation suit. They look, ironically, like misplaced astronauts. The colonists themselves get provided with identical white cotton t-shirts and grey sweat pants, together with socks, underwear and some basic toiletries. All their own clothes are presumably off being disinfected or incinerated somewhere.

He spends the next ten days there, with ninety-eight people who take turns coming up to him to hug him, shake his hand, clap him on the back and thank him, and one who avoids him like the plague they’re being tested for.

The first time he ventures out of his room and finds his way to the common lounge, Jensen is there. He’s seated on a couch facing away from Jared. Jared’s heart leaps into his throat; he nearly turns around and leaves.

He misses his chance. The room falls quiet as people notice Jared’s arrival, and then there’s a swarm of them around him, asking if he’s okay. Jared reassures them absently, eyes fixed on the back of Jensen’s head.

Jensen stands. Turns.

Jared wants to think that was relief he saw flash over Jensen’s face, but it’s gone in an instant. The man walking towards him radiates only anger and betrayal.

The others fall back, politely turning their attention away, although Jared can hear murmurs as Jensen approaches him. He stops in front of Jared and just studies him, eyes tracking over him. Cataloguing all Jared’s imperfections.

Jensen, of course, looks perfect. He’s no longer drunk, no longer crippled by pain; he looks as gorgeous as the day Jared first saw him, and he’s back to being just as unattainable.

“Hey,” Jared says finally.

Jensen’s fists clench. He looks like he’s about to punch Jared, and Jared almost wishes he would.

He doesn’t. His jaw works, and Jared thinks he’s about to say something, but instead Jensen spins on his heel and leaves.

He can’t really leave, of course; they’re all stuck here together for the next several days. He instead completely ignores Jared and rebuffs anyone who says anything positive about Jared within his earshot. If he’s eating when Jared arrives in the dining hall, he abandons his food; if he’s in the common room when Jared walks in, he immediately heads back to his room. Jared doesn’t even try to visit him there.

To Jared’s mortification, a couple of his friends try to talk to Jensen. Jensen walks away from Hiroko, and slams the door on Katie.

Tamara does her best. She’s assigned to take daily blood samples on all the colonists, and she waits until she’s got a needle in Jensen’s vein. Kenji was next in line, and later tells Jared how Tamara had talked louder and louder over Jensen’s bland indifference, describing the events of the last day on Mirna: how Jared had carried Jensen to the infirmary; how he’d helped her to run the tests; how it had been his insight that had solved the problem and saved all their lives.

Jensen had yanked the needle out of his arm, gotten up and walked away leaving a trail of blood drops on the floor, as Tamara shouted the last few sentences at him.

 

  


 

That’s not the only task Tamara has. The rest of them spend a few hours a day being debriefed, answering questions about the ship, the planet, whether the buildings had been suitable, what equipment they had along that might have been superfluous... every day there are new topics, new questions. Behind them all, the unspoken, overarching question: _what went wrong?_

Tamara gets to skip the smaller questions in favor of the one big one. After Jared’s done his interview each day – and he’s running out of things to tell them about seedlings and irrigation tile – he heads for the lab they’ve set up for her. It’s not a full medical research facility, of course, but they’ve brought in a number of things she asked for. She’s working in tandem with a number of other scientists out in the real world, trading ideas and data over the net. They have more equipment and people; she has the advantage of personal experience and access to instant samples any time she wants.

The first day, he just watched her, happy to be somewhere he knew Jensen was unlikely to venture. The second day, she let him sit quietly for half an hour and then started assigning him jobs.

On the fifth day she lifts her head from the microscope and says, “This is stupid. It isn’t infectious. Get me a spectrophotometer.”

“Wouldn’t it be simpler to have them do it?” Jared says, glancing briefly away from the cryotome where he’s busy slicing very thin frozen sections of a muscle biopsy.

“Probably.”

Jared raises his eyebrows.

“This is my project,” she says. “ _Our_ project. Besides, they won’t let our soil samples out of this building yet. You know how to run one, right?”

Jared frowns dubiously. “It’s been a while.”

“It’s like riding a bike,” she says dismissively. “Get one. Tell them it’s urgent.”

It’s delivered within the hour, and Jared spends the rest of the day reading the manual and running some test mixtures. When he arrives the next day, the table is covered with rows and rows of samples: soil, water, air, plant matter. Tamara waves him toward them. “Get to it.”

On the eighth day, Jared walks over to Tamara and puts a print-out in front of her.

She scans the rows of readings and puts a finger on the peak Jared had noticed: a chemical spike that stands out from most of the other samples. “There?”

“Yeah. Do you think…?”

“Only one way to find out!” She jiggles her knee excitedly. “You isolate the compound; I’ll make up an assay with our receptors. We’ll expose them to it and compare how it affects them, yours and mine. Which sample is it, anyway?”

“The ones from the night of the storm. All of them have it.”

Tamara frowns. “So it fell in the rain?”

“Or blew in off the water.” Jared points to another peak on the printout. “All the samples have it in trace amounts – I mean, _all_ of them, not just the ones from that night – but it’s a little higher in the lake samples. Maybe it’s something made by one of those big algae blooms.”

She shrugs. “Sounds like a good theory. You’re the plant guy.”

“Algae aren’t exactly plants.”

“Whatever. Can you isolate that peak?”

“I’m not an organic chemist,” Jared points out. “You should probably get one of the guys outside to do it.”

“Can you do it?”

“Probably.”

“Then get on with it.” She taps her foot.

Jared does so.

Mid-afternoon on the following day, they take turns staring at the assay results, before Tamara lets out a whoop and grabs Jared by the arms, dancing him around in a circle.

“That’s it,” she sings, “that’s the one. Fuck, I am brilliant.”

“I found it,” Jared objects.

“It was my idea, wasn’t it?”

“Fine, you’re brilliant.”

“So are you. God. We did it.” She beams. “We can get _out_ of here. Let’s get them on the phone!”

 

  


 

Of course NASA, the FDA, the EPA, the CDC, and at least six other acronyms want to verify the findings. But the data Tamara presents at a hastily-assembled video conference looks pretty clear.

“This compound is ubiquitously present in the planet’s atmosphere. Spectrophotometric analysis of all samples show it to a greater or lesser degree. Levels increased dramatically during the storm that we experienced, perhaps due to it being blown from regions of higher concentration.”

She changes the display from the chemical data to the immunofluorescent assay. “It’s water-soluble, and easily vaporized. When ingested, it binds to a region on the modified variant of the GABA receptor which locks its configuration, preventing GABA binding. This results in loss of GABA function in the body, triggering pain, seizures, and eventually death.”

“So it’s definite that only genetically modified persons are affected?” asks someone in the CDC’s boardroom. At least, Jared thinks it’s the CDC: a number of small images along the bottom of Tamara’s video screen show similar groups of people clustered around boardroom tables, and he can’t really tell which is which, apart from the military.

“Not quite. Remember, the mod was designed using the most stable naturally-occurring variant of the GABA receptor. So anyone who has that variant is susceptible, including non-modified persons who inherited it naturally from their parents.”

“Is there a way to fix it?” The question comes from the group Jared’s pretty sure is NASA.

“Probably not.” It isn’t Tamara who answers this time. Jared peers at the screen and blinks; the man talking is sitting next to Jeff Morgan in M-Gen’s meeting room. “It’s extremely unlikely you’d be able to eliminate the compound from the atmosphere, and you can’t un-modify the GMPs.”

Tamara nods. “Which means, you’d have to come up with a drug that would bind to the mod receptor in the same region but without inactivating it. Maybe it could be done, but it’s pretty unlikely.”

“Even if you could,” the man says, “any mod living on Mirna would have to remember to take pills every single day. And so would every successive generation.”

It’s not a viable solution. Even Jared, agricultural biologist, can see that. It’s tough enough to set up a pioneer world without having to factor in mandatory, large-scale drug synthesis and distribution.

There is silence for a while, eventually broken by someone in the military group. “What about adjusting the mod? We know that Mr. Padalecki’s receptors are resistant. Couldn’t we create a new mod, using those?”

“We could.” Jeff Morgan speaks for the first time. “Technically, that’s dead easy. You’re not going to have any potential colonists out of diapers for the next few years, though. We still haven’t cracked the secret of modifying adults.”

“We could,” says the man next to him, leaning forward in his chair with elbows on his knees, “but we shouldn’t. Mirna has given you the clearest demonstration you could ask for of the importance of a non-clonal population. Without the mod, only a handful of people would have been affected. They probably could have solved it on-planet. Even if not, the colony would still remain viable with a loss of under ten percent.”

That prompts some shocked muttering from the other groups, but he continues. “Send a _truly_ mixed bunch next time. For all we know, there’s something else there that Mr. Padalecki would have been susceptible to, if he’d stayed long enough to encounter it. We don’t know what role genes play in different environments, and sometimes something that seems a flaw is an advantage in other settings – look at sickle cell anemia, or cystic fibrosis.”

“Thank you for your input, Dr. Collins,” Jeff says, but the man – Dr. Collins – isn’t finished.

“The mod looks to perfect the individual, but the robustness and adaptability of the species comes from our variety – our imperfections. Embrace them.”

“ _Thank you_ , Dr. Collins,” Jeff says again, with steel in his tone. Dr. Collins acknowledges this with a tiny tilt of his head, and sits back.

There’s still some general muttering going on within the individual groups, which is cut short when the head of NASA raps on her table.

“We will continue to move ahead with colonization of Mirna. It remains our only viable target planet within reach at present, and we already have infrastructure in place. Dr. Martin, thank you for your invaluable work on characterizing the unfortunate setback that befell you and the rest of our brave pioneers. You understand that we will, of course, be running further experiments to verify your findings, in addition to our ongoing analysis of environmental and medical samples.”

She steeples her fingers. “However, it would appear empirically that for now, we will be looking to select a new crew of non-modified individuals to return and carry on the work that Dr. Martin and her fellow colonists began.”

 

  


 

When the video link is cut, Tamara sinks into a chair. Jared is startled to see tears in her eyes, and then kicks himself for forgetting.

“I’m sorry,” he says softly. “I know it was your dream.”

“It’s okay.” She swipes at her cheeks. “Maybe some day. Just not there.”

“Yes!” Jared says. “They’re looking for other possibilities, all the time. And at least we’ve proved Jeff’s ship works, and that the plans were good… things were going great, at the beginning. We’ll find a new planet. You watch, five or ten years from now, we’ll be shipping out again.”

She spins the chair around and looks up at him. “You could go back, you know. You’ve got a proven track record. They’d be stupid not to take you.”

Jared blinks. It’s obvious, but it hadn’t actually occurred to him. For one thing, he’d assumed there would be consequences for his deception, although that seems to have been swept under the rug: it probably wouldn’t play well in the media to prosecute the heroic rescuer. For another, he’s part of this crew. If it wasn’t going anywhere, then neither was he.

If Jensen wasn’t going anywhere…

…but that’s not going anywhere, either.

“I guess I could,” he says. He can hear how flat his voice sounds.

Tamara reaches out and takes his hand.

“I’m sorry too,” she says. “Maybe he’ll come around?”

“Yeah, well,” Jared says. “Maybe some day.”

He doesn’t believe it.

 

  


 

Jensen is clearly the aggrieved party here. Jared lied to everyone, broke the law, and had sex with Jensen under false pretences. So it’s really fucking annoying to have Danneel come over to his place, interrupt his sulking, and tell him that he’s being a dick.

“He isn’t a mod, Danni!” Jensen doesn’t understand why she can’t get this through her skull. “He lied to me! I think I have a right to be upset.”

“You’re upset because he made you realize that all your prejudice is just that – prejudice.” Danneel held up her hand to forestall his interruption. “You liked him, you fucked him, he _saved your life_ , and then you turn around and act like a complete asshole to him. Isn’t he still the same guy you fell for? Did the hyperdrive jump on the way home give him a complete personality transplant or something?”

“That’s not the point!” Jensen fumes. “He knew how I felt. Wouldn’t _you_ be upset if someone lied to you about something that important, just to get in your pants?”

“I don’t think it was _just_ that,” Danneel says dryly. “I’m pretty sure wanting to go into space had something to do with it. Especially as you didn’t hook up until after you’d already left. I know you think you’re all that and a bag of chips, but Jared didn’t pull off his big fake-out for you. He did it to get on the mission.”

“Still,” Jensen says, crossing his arms and wearing a mutinous expression. “He shouldn’t have lied to me.”

“Did you ask him? Did he ever actually _tell_ you he was a mod?”

Jensen opens his mouth to answer, then pauses to think.

“Ha!”

“So what?” he snaps. “He let me think he was. Even before he lied his way onto the colony ship. Maybe he didn’t tell a lie right to my face, Danni, but he knew how I felt about the whole issue and he didn’t tell me. He lied by omission.”

“Yeah, and why do you think he did that?” She throws up her hands in exasperation. “He didn’t correct your mistaken assumption because he thinks the sun shines out your ass, heaven knows why. He is _stupid_ over you, Jensen, and he saved your damn life. So maybe get off your high horse and go apologize. And then fuck him sideways, assuming you can lower yourself to sully your dick with someone who isn’t as genetically perfect – oh, excuse me, _inadequate_ – as us.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

“You know that’s not really what you want to be doing,” Danneel says archly. “Get over yourself, and call him.”

 

  


 

Jensen doesn’t call Jared.

Instead, he hangs around the park near Jared’s apartment for hours on end so he can “accidentally” encounter Jared during his evening run.

Jared’s all hot and damp, flush burning high on his cheeks. Jensen watches a bead of sweat roll down his throat and unconsciously licks his lips. Jared’s eyes darken, watching the movement.

“I’m sorry,” Jensen blurts out. “I’ve said some really fucking stupid things. You and Tam and everyone were right, I was being a prejudiced asshole and I was wrong about non-mods. I mean…” he waves a hand at Jared. “Look at _you_.”

“Don’t,” Jared breaks in. “I’m sorry too. I should have told you right from the start. I just…”

He looks away, up at the sky, then back at Jensen.

“You’re amazing. You’re _perfect._ I wanted… I wanted that, I wanted _you._ I was glad we were friends, and I didn’t want to ruin that. I would have been happy even if we just went on being friends. And then… it was – oh fuck, this sounds cheesy, but I don’t know how else to say it – it was like a dream come true. I had you. I wanted to keep you. I wanted to share the stars with you.”

Jensen swallows. “I wanted that too.”

“I was lying to you, and I hated myself for that, but there never seemed to be a good way to tell you. You’d made it pretty clear, what you thought about non-mods. You never even talk about your family.”

Jensen sighs. “Yeah. My family weren’t – well, things didn’t turn out the way they thought it would, I guess. I got a lot of shit growing up, about being a mod – most of the ‘normal’ kids in school were real dicks to me. I ended up hanging out mostly with other mods. When I moved here, I thought things might be better, but I had a couple of bad experiences with non-mods and I guess I just gave up. Assumed all of you were assholes.”

“Not all of us, just some,” Jared says. “And I don’t think non-mods have a monopoly on being assholes.”

Jensen laughs ruefully and rubs his forehead. “Evidently not.”

Jared’s mouth quirks. “We all have our flaws. What made you change your mind?”

“Danni,” Jensen admits. “She beat some sense into me.”

“Not literally, I hope.”

“She could totally take me in a fight,” Jensen agrees. “She could probably take you.”

“I hope I never find out,” Jared says fervently.

Jensen nods.

“So, uh,” Jared says. “What now?”

“I don’t know,” Jensen answers honestly. “Have I fucked things up too badly? Or do you think we could give it another go?”

“They asked me to go back,” Jared blurts out. “In the next wave. They asked me to head up the team.”

“You should go,” Jensen says after a long pause. His voice is as steady as he can make it. He stares at Jared’s shoulder, afraid that if he meets his eyes, he’ll falter. “Like you said, it’s the adventure of a lifetime.”

Jared reaches out and takes his hand. It’s tentative, as if he’s still afraid Jensen might recoil from his touch. Jensen grips back strongly, an impossible hope rising in him.

“This is going to be a pretty good adventure,” Jared says. “I’ll trade the stars for you.”

 

_the end_

 

  


[Art Masterpost](http://ladytiferet.livejournal.com/25974.html)


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